There By the Grace of God We Go
by Servant of Fire
Summary: Set in a slightly AU midS13: Dean and Sam had an explosive fight. Trying to calm down after Sam stormed out, Dean hears Jack having a nightmare and intervenes. What he learns from the Nephilim about Sam's time in the Cage shakes him to his core. Just how deep did Sam's last sacrifice run?
1. Chapter 1

**There By the Grace of God We Go:**

"Maybe if you actually took the time to get to know him a little bit you wouldn't think he was anything like Lucifer!" Sam slammed his open palm on the table.

"He's the Devil's kid! I sound like a freaking broken record. How many times do I have to remind you HE'S LUCIFER'S SON!" Dean smashed a beer bottle over one of the garbage cans.

"Oh, yeah! You think I don't know that? You think that I don't know about Lucifer's evil? ME?!

Really, Dean?! I SPENT 120 FRIGGIN TIME LOOPING YEARS IN HELL WITH THAT BASTARD!" Sam's nose was bleeding now he was so worked up.

Dean drew back like he'd been slapped. That was the first time Sam had ever actually outright confessed the actual "time" duration in the Cage to Dean.

"You...What?" Dean swallowed, feeling his legs turn to jelly beneath him.

"No, okay...Really, no. I'm not doin' that now. You hate Jack? Fine. Just don't kill him until I get back." Sam shook his head, wiped his nose, winced, and pulled on his jacket all at once.

"Where are you going?" Dean suddenly deeply regretted this fight and it was barely even over.

"I just...I need some air. Okay? I'll be back in a little while. And I know, don't touch your car. Don't worry about it. I'll take one of the bikes." Sam tossed his head, snatching up his wallet and storming toward the stairs.

"Sam?" Dean's voice was already apologetic but Sam was evidently too upset to care.

"I'm serious. Don't do anything to the kid, got it?! If you really want to have a problem with me, you do just that." Sam slammed the door behind him.

Dean stood in the echoing wake of his little brother's words. He felt his stomach clench. They'd had thousands of fights. Obviously, they were brothers. But that felt different. Sam was more hurt than he should have been from just a normal argument.

Dean settled into the silence wondering where Sam was. He thought about calling him but realized that would probably piss him off more. Then he started to worry if he'd flashback like he used to when they were younger and the Cage was mentioned. Dean felt near to tears then. Oh, God. What had he done?

Just then he heard Jack's voice cry out.

"No!"

Worrying a demon had gotten in to try to make off with the Nephilim, Dean stormed guns blazing into the kid's room.

"Whoa-oh, hey! What the-?" Dean flinched when he saw the boy was just having a nightmare.

Dean stood there looking down at the thrashing young hybrid. There was an instant and uninvited flashback. Of Sam, about 22-years-old, thrashing like that in the throes of many nightmares that followed Jessica's death.

Dean felt his hand go out to comfort the kid as if he was Sam.

"Hey...Hey, uh, kid. Wake up. It's not...It's cool." Dean touched Jack's flailing hand. All of the sudden, he was yanked into the most graphic, horrific dream that had ever been.

 _"Of course I can do blood magic, idiot! I invented it. Michael's as good as a jailbreak. Maybe that'll finally, you know, call it square. And you can have Dean back. Granted, you'll watch me torture him forever and ever and ever-have to get even with you, you know, since I can't get out ever again. But you won't be alone and he won't have to know it's because you asked to get off my rack. He woulda did the same, I'd bet if the stories I heard about his little tour down here are true._

 _I have to have consent from you, Sam. Red tape and all that! And if you refuse, well, that's gonna cost you...Like, climb into my next fun little rat trap and let me turn your bones into jelly kinda cost ya." Lucifer snickered, wearing Sam's face now. The dream was clearly from Sam's perspective, even though Jack was the one dreaming._

 _"You can be rid of this pain, boy. As my real vessel, Dean's blood is definitely powerful enough to do that. You and Dean are blood brothers, so yours works to call out to his. But angel magic needs consent. No need to suffer alone forever. Don't you want to see your brother? Because you know, if you don't, that's fine. It's just...we'll be sure to make you pay for it." Michael purred from a corner, desperate. Dean felt Sam's blistered eyes move to Michael._

 _Sam swallowed. Dean was trying to reach him, keep him from doing this._

 _"What the hell is wrong with you guys? You stupid or somethin'? Asking me to do that to my brother? It's not like you'd keep your end of the deal anyway. You'd keep torturing me too. No way in Hell I'm letting you magic Dean down here! This rat trap, how do I play?"_

Dean was snapped out of it. Something about his hand on Jack's hand had comforted the baby Nephilim and he'd been roused from the nightmare into a different dream he didn't let Dean see.

Dean stared at the sleeping half-angel kid for about 20 minutes before he stumbled out of the room in shock.

Was that...That couldn't be real, could it?

How the heck would Jack have dreamed about the Cage otherwise?

Dean went into the study. He poured a stiff bit of whiskey.

An hour went by with Dean slowly getting skunked. Finally, he could take no more of it. He called Sam.

"What?" Sam's voice was waspish even in the grainy reception of the phone.

To Dean's shock, he heard the sounds of a bar behind Sam.

"You good to drive?"

"What's it to you?

Ouch.

"Because I need you to come home."

"Oh, you need me to come home. What so are you like my parole officer now? Forget it-I'm…"

"Sammy... _Please come home_." Dean let out a cracked sob around those words. Sam paused, listening.

"Wait...Are you okay?! Did something happen?" Sam's voice had immediately softened.

"Not..not exactly. But...Look, man, I'm sorry about...Please. Please just come home, Sam. I need to talk to you and I can't do it over the phone." Dean coughed, took a long swill of the drink.

"I'm at Mickey's down on 9th. I'm about 20 minutes out. Can it wait that long?" Sam sounded nervous.

"Uhuh, look there's no trouble here. The kid's fine. Everything's good. I just...Please...I need to ask you something and I...I really am sorry about earlier...I didn't…"Dean is crying now, God help him. Sam made a soft sound of realization over the phone.

"This is about what I said right before I left?"

"Kinda...yeah, kinda."

"Okay, I'm coming."

Dean paced the entire time he waited. Finally, the door to the stair cage opened. Sam slinked in like a teenager caught out past curfew.

Dean turned to face him, choosing not to hide the fact he'd been crying. Sam paused at the landing, studying him as if he was weighing his response to that. His face was pinched with sudden regret about their fight.

"It...Probably wudn't fair to drop a bombshell like that on you that...uhh...gruffly. I'm sorry, man." Sam pushed his hair out of his eyes, laughing nervously.

"Mm…"Dean nodded to the table. He could barely stand up.

They sat down together, Sam's eyes wide with worry. Dean swallowed, tapping his knuckles against the table.

"If I ask you a loaded question, you gonna be straight with me?" Dean looked up, trying to keep a straight face. He felt like screaming. Sam nodded, uncertain.

"Okay, so I...When you left, the kid had a nightmare. I thought demons got him. So, I went in there to see what he was making racket for. I tried to wake him up. When he touched me, I saw what he was dreamin' bout." Dean swallowed. Sam's jaw dropped.

"Oh, God...If he overheard me, then...?" Sam's lips were trembling. Dean nodded, slowly.

"Sam...In his dream, he was you. Lucifer and Michael were trying to make a deal with you. Lucifer could use blood magic to get Michael out but suck me in there. He said he'd stop torturing you if you gave the needed consent to like use your blood for the spell or whatever…"Dean talked extremely quietly and gravelly. The mist in Sam's eyes was already confirming his fear, but he had to hear him say it to know it was true.

"Is...Uhh...Did that...Did that really happen?" Dean swallowed and shoved his fist to his mouth.

Sam was crying now. Tears, splashing down his face. He nodded ever so slowly.

"I would never….I'd never agree to that. I swear. That place...What they meant to do...It was too horrible, Dean. Too horrible…" Sam gulped. Dean let out a shaky breath, getting dizzy.

"And when were you gonna tell me? Tell me...that you...um...that you did that?" Dean was clinging to his shot glass so hard now he was cracking it.

"Listen, Dean….I...uhh…"

"Tell me the truth, Sammy." Dean looked up ever so slowly, face resigned to the answer.

"I...I wasn't. It ...I didn't want you to know about it. I never wanted you to know anything about that...That place." Sam looked away, cupping his mouth in his hand.

"God! What the hell have I done? What if Jack saw other things? Opening my damned stupid mouth, I shouldn't- I shouldn't have…"Sam was shaking now.

Dean reached over and turned Sam to look at him. He was crying again too, and couldn't talk for a second.

"You weren't going to tell me that you saved me from the Cage?" Dean swallowed. Sam cringed.

"Please don't...Don't get like pissed or whatever. If you knew...you couldn't change it and-Well, you'd just feel bad about it and I…" Sam bowed his head. Dean tilted his face back up by his chin. Finally, Dean, exasperated, stood up.

"Come here…"His voice was barely audible. Sam tried to look away from him again,

"Come here, Sam."Dean's voice was a little louder now. Finally, Sam got up and went into his brother's arms. He laid his head on Dean's shoulder and cried like a baby at the memories that were bleeding back.

Dean nodded and pulled back after a while, taking Sam's face in either hand.

"You...You saved me. You never told me, but you did. Sam, what are you crying for, huh? Shh, please don't cry. I'm sorry...If I'da known that...So many things I've said to you since...I'd never have...Sam?I'm sorry, little brother, really…"Dean kissed his brother's forehead. Sam flinched, and whimpered, but leaned into it anyway. Dean thumbed his tears off.

"I...Whoa...Dude, I'm never...I'm not gonna ever know what to say to that...Never gonna get my head around it." Dean cringed. Sam nodded.

"Well, then don't. If I had to do it again, I would. It's...you know, I'm okay. It's just, Jack. I don't...He doesn't have to be like his Dad, Dean. He doesn't." Sam bowed his head, tears splashing into Dean's palms.

Dean nodded.

"Okay, I...If you...after everything...think you can help the kid, then fine. I won't say nothing else. Come on...Please...I could keel over, man. Why don't we watch TV? Until one of us dozes off from our wretched drunken ways…"Dean wrapped an arm around Sam...leading him rag doll limp to their den where he'd set up an old TV.

Neither one fell asleep. And Dean couldn't get out the words _I love you...I'm sorry you suffered like that. Thank you_. But his heart said them. Sam understood. He leaned against his brother's shoulder in complete silence for hours, never once regretting what he'd done. And just like that, fight or no fight, against Hell and Heaven and Fate itself, they were just brothers again.


	2. Chapter 2

**What I'd Ask**

 **Tag to S5x21 "Two Minutes to Midnight"**

 **Author's Note: Sam's poem in this story is a parody of "All I Ask" by Adele, the song that inspired this part. I recommend listening to that song when you read this part.**

After that last conversation, Dean was shaken to the core. There were many things from over the years that Dean didn't know.

The months and weeks passed. Chaos had ensued. They got Cas back. They had to go about the business of saving Mom and Jack from Apocalypse world now.

Sam was in the library, studying until his brain was mush. Cas was watching Netflix. Dean was left to his own devices and his own wonderings. And he was wondering painfully tonight. About the things that he'd learned from Jack's dream. About what other things Sam had kept to himself over the years, considering their last descent into the world of the Apocalypse.

Into Dean's mind flashed an image, unlooked for, of the final days before Sam's sacrifice. Sam, smiling at him, apologetic and placid as he'd used to be. Dean had been too angry about the betrayal and terror of those days to look back for long. But he could see this, clear as day. The day that Crowley had given Bobby back the use of his legs.

 _Remember when this job was just hunting Wendigos?_

Sam was asking Dean to remember when they were brothers in that twilight hour of the world. And truly, the Apocalypse had not been all his fault. How could it? He'd only played the cards he'd been dealt, a bad hand though it had been.

Dean shouldn't have done it. He'd regret it forever, but he could not help himself. He started digging through Sam's things knowing Sam would not emerge from the library for many hours yet. Discreetly, he put everything back the way he'd found it.

Until he found the small leather bound journal that Sam had kept ever since he'd been alone during Dean's time in Hell. He'd used to retain sanity in those dark days, that much Dean knew. He also knew there were notes about his own odyssey in the deep. It stopped sometime around the Trials. Sam hadn't taken up journaling since.

Dean opened the book and leafed through the first several pages. He didn't have the heart to read about while he was gone just yet. He wanted to know what was going on in those days when they were alienated from each other. What had Sam thought during the eleventh hour? What was in Sammy's head right before he stepped off into an Eternity with Lucifer in Hell?

Dean would never be prepared for what he found. A page with the date from the day that he'd just remembered. Written next to that date was "Two Minutes to Midnight". Then below it was:

"If I take on the Devil, it's for him. Everything, always, even when it was wrong was for him. He never could see that.-S.W.".

And under that, set up in meters, a poem or the parody of a song, Dean wasn't certain what. He would have laughed at the thought of geek boy Sam writing poems and such until he realized the doom that was scrawled out here.

 **What I'd Ask:**

 _I will leave my soul on Hell's floor,_

 _No more words, it's all been shouted out before,_

 _And now I'll just play pretend,_

 _Like I'm not scared of what comes next,_

 _Or scared of his just being left-_

 _Don't get me wrong, I know_

 _There is no tomorrow,_

 _But if there was, What I'd ask…_

 _If this is my last night with him,_

 _Wish he'd see me as more than a means to an end,_

 _That he'd give me a memory I could use,_

 _It matters how it all ends,_

 _Cause I will never love again-_

A _nd all I have's his honesty,_

 _It's in his eyes, and I can see,_

 _My guilty eyes won't speak for me,_

 _No one knows you like I do,_

 _And since you were the only one who mattered,_

 _Tell me what am I supposed to do?_

 _But don't get me wrong, I know_

 _There is no tomorrow,_

 _Still, if I could ask…._

 _If this is my last night on earth,_

 _See me as more than a means to an end,_

 _I need a memory I can use,_

 _Take my shoulders in hand, so we'd do what brother's do,_

 _It matters how it all ends,_

 _I know I'll never love again-_

 _A painful lesson for me in love,_

 _This is the way that I remember us,_

 _Just this once don't be cruel or vicious,_

 _I can't ask you for forgiveness,_

 _If I could ask-_

 _Cause this, this is my last night on earth,_

 _Couldn't I be something like your friend?_

 _I need a memory I can use,_

 _I wish we could do what brothers do,_

 _To me, it matters how this ends,_

 _Cause I will never rise again…_

Those words hit Dean like a torpedo going off in his guts. He was expecting tears. Anger with Dean. Horror. It never registered to Dean that Sam would be so resigned in the end. That he would bottle all of this up. That he would dedicate his final act for Dean. It wasn't so much about penance for him as it was about making things right with and for his brother.

But he'd not had the heart to ask. He thought he didn't deserve it. That his dying, his burning in Hell would be the only way to earn it. Of all the things he could have wished for as a dying wish (Dean knew how that worked, and he'd had plenty) this was the cruelest one. He wanted his brother. Wanted his brother to be his brother again. He thought he didn't love him anymore. That he'd only seen him as a means to cleaning up the mess.

Sam had gone away to fight Lucifer with the mindset, perfectly founded at the time, that he would be there in the deep for Eternity. Which meant that he'd been prepared to stay there until the planets burned away, and Dean was long placed in some Utopia version of heaven that was decidedly lacking in Sam's half. Sam wasn't just dying. Young men on the battlefield for centuries had been able to resign themselves to the hope of a glorious afterlife. Even Dean had a bit of a shield when he'd died because Hell was more of a mystery. Sam knew who he'd be with forever, and what the guy would have a mind to do to him for it.

And his last thought had just been wishing for a happy ending between him and his brother, his reason.

Dean laid the journal on the bed. He took three steps and passed out in the hallway.

Cas found him lying there. He read his mind and was mortified. Then, he carried him to his bedroom. He decided not to tell Sam about it. It was better if Sam and Dean worked these things out on their own.

Cas didn't remember a single time in his life that he had to hole up somewhere and cry for several hours. But that night, knowing what Sam and Dean had sacrificed to save the world last time...Cas cried.

Sam went to bed wondering why everything was quiet. He saw the journal on his bed and had the sick passing thought that Dean had seen his soul naked. Shaking his head, more pressing matters shooting paper airplanes around his mind, he set the journal on the table and went to sleep. In his dreams, the Devil tortured him like he'd done for eons. No one would ever know about it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Open Arms:**

The next day Sam was so wrapped up in his research, he didn't notice Dean's absence for several hours. Not until he finally decided he needed to get out of the bunker for a few hours.

"Dean! Hey, I'm heading out. You need anythin'?" Sam paused. It was unduly quiet.

Sam felt a sudden panic rise in his chest, constricting his breathing. And then Cas' voice spoke to him from the corner.

"He...He's not here. But he's not in trouble. I-Your journal, Sam. I don't know why he read it but it has shaken him deeply." Cas' voice still shook with tears. Sam turned to see him, see his teary eyes.

"And now...Now you know what it said too, huh?" Sam smiled sheepishly.

Cas smiled a single tear falling down his face. Sam nodded.

"I'm sorry you had to know that…"

"No...It...I'm sorry that we were so indifferent to your former sufferings." Cas bowed his head. Sam nodded.

"Where is he?" Sam figured it was about time to make this right.

"At Mickey's…" Cas smiled. Sam was heading for the door.

"Then that's where I'm going. And I might be gone for a while." Sam smiled wistfully. He took one of the bunker's old cafe racer Bonnevilles into town.

When he pulled in, he expected to see Dean in a forlorn pose, sipping whiskey until it ran from his eyes. He would not have expected, not in all his years, what he did see.

Mickey had an old piano he kept in the corner. Sam had only seen Dean plucking around on a piano once. That was when he had come to take him home. To cure him of being a demon. This time, Dean was playing it like he had been trained by the maestros. Sam had forgotten that this was karaoke night at the bar. That the people gathered around were all as lonely as Dean must have felt when he walked in. They all swayed along to the tune of "Open Arms" by Journey, that Dean sang now without throwing his impressive voice.

No one in the bar noticed what Sam noticed. That Dean, in his sadness, had altered the lyrics.

 _Dying beside you,_

 _Facing the dark,_

 _Your heartbeat ending with mine,_

 _That was the end,_

 _The only one for me,_

 _How could I have been blind?_

 _We rode on together_

 _But drifted apart,_

 _And somehow you stayed_

 _By my side-_

He drifted into the chorus, that he had not changed. No one protested. Sam swaggered into the bar, tears in his eyes...The song wasn't meant for the rest of them. He knew who Dean was singing to, even though he had no idea that Sam had just walked in.

Dean's shoulders tensed as the next verse came. And Sam heard the choked down tears in the words, even though none of the other barflies batted an eye.

 _Living without you and_

 _Dying alone,_

 _Eternity in coming so cold,_

 _Wanting to tell you,_

 _Wanting you alive,_

 _How much I needed you home,_

 _Somehow you came back…_

 _Turned night to day,_

 _I need you...this time to stay…_

Dean sang the last chorus part, never looking up from the mic. And when the song faded to silence, there were faint clapping sounds from all sides, but then the world moved on.

Dean turned on the piano's bench. He was swilling whiskey, straight from the bottle he'd bought.

Sam felt the cold of the wind blowing in the door behind him. It was enough of a chill to bring Dean's eyes up where they saw his brother. He blinked as if he thought he was tripping. Then he stood up, swaggering, swilling the bottle. He was wasted. Sam cringed.

Dean came up to Sam and thrust the bottle to his chest, holding up above Sam's heart.

"I think...Maybe you should drive?" Dean's eyes fluttered. Sam nodded. He could come back for the bike later.

He put Dean in the Impala's shotgun seat. No sooner had the doors shut them in the cab than Dean was staring at him, crying.

"I don't know why the hell I did that to myself. I wanted to know what was happening in your head and then when I did...And I...And it didn't set in that we would be split up for Eternity forever until the day after you died. And I...I remembered and you died thinking that I didn't care...and…"Dean gulped back a sob. He was too wasted to know what he was saying.

Sam turned to look at him as he laid his head in his hands and cried. Then, swallowing, he reached over and hugged Dean to his chest. Dean was crying his eyes out, but totally in silence.

"What would I ever do...if you...like again?" Dean's fingers twisted in Sam's shirt.

"Honestly? There by the grace of God, man...I don't know." Sam laid his face in Dean's hair. They rarely ever took a second like this to acknowledge how deeply broken the both of them were. Dean might not even remember tomorrow. It was maybe selfish, but Sam needed to let himself take this in. Just for a second...


	4. Chapter 4

**A Lesson Learned None Too Late**

When Sam got home, his weariness made his bones feel like aluminum cans. His blood was soda in him, shaking and bubbling with the sadness of drunken Dean, still sobbing against his shoulder.

He led him into his man cave and laid him down in front of the TV. He pulled his shoes and socks off, hands unintentionally caressing Dean's feet. A shadow drew his attention and made him realize the fond way he was making over his brother. As if he was a vague and broken child and not the demon slayer with a belt full of legions. Sam looked up, stunned.

Castiel. He and Sam didn't have much time to bond alone. Sam swallowed when he saw the look on his friend's face. This was going to be one of those rare alone moments where the angel got something off his chest.

Sam smiled. He nodded to Dean.

"He'll be sleeping for a while."

Cas crept closer and looked down at Dean with wide, crying eyes.

"I never thought it possible."

"What?" Sam shifted, following Cas' gaze.

"That any human soul was capable of such selfless love, or grief. I am old, Sam. Far older than I can convey to your human understanding. I've seen so many ages of human life. Witnessed so many humans in Heaven, sometimes on Earth, and yes many times in Hell. And I would swear on my life, I thought you were shallow creatures." Cas was crying now. Something that surprised Sam deeply.

"But it was as if God had saved the best for last." Cas knelt beside Dean, lips trembling. He closed his eyes, as the tears rolled into his palm. Sam wondered if he should do something, but he figured he should let the ancient being express himself in his own way.

"I had never hoped to meet any human that loved so infinitely. And then, I pulled Dean Winchester from Hell. It was an experience to shake all religion loose. The surge of righteous understanding that shot straight up my arm, and went to my head with all my years of studied loftiness. The man's soul was simply too pure for the place, for it was too pure for even Heaven. Too pure to be dead. And it was honestly only bleached so pure because of how deeply he loved you. You, who were, at the time, understood to be an Abomination. A Cosmic joke I find no amusement in now..." Cas stood up and looked at Sam, the tears pouring down his face.

"I always kept my safe distance from you...But I've seen the splinters of your soul trying to mesh with all the shattered pieces of him. Every inch of his innermost thoughts slashed to ribbons by you! For the love of him, and to Hell with all the world, you burned. And I let you burn, Sam. I let you burn and I never asked forgiveness…"Cas bowed his head. Sam understood then.

"You...This is about all those years ago when we had that falling out, isn't it?" Sam swallowed. Cas looked back down at Dean and laid a fond hand atop his head, shaking his own head with grave remorse.

Cas turned away from Dean then and rushed to Sam and embraced him fiercely. Sam froze and then he allowed it. Cas bowed his head to his shoulder and cried for a long, long time. Sam held him, understanding. Cas had become every bit the brother to him that Dean was. He needed to allow him to have this.

"I should never have let you burn, Sam. I should have found a way to save you both from your fate that saved the world. I should never have gone to war with Raphael. It should never have been up to Death to finally raise you from the torment your journal and Jack's dreams describe…"Cas nuzzled Sam's shoulder. Sam drew a deep breath, brought near tears himself.

"Cas...Listen, buddy, I forgave you for all that a long time ago." Sam nodded. Cas leaned back and collared Sam.

"Tell me, boy? Does that make it alright?" Cas's voice came out as a hoarse metallic hiccup. Sam bit his lip.

"Does it make breaking your wall, sentencing you to death by hallucination alright? Sam!" Cas swallowed a sudden gasp that made it look like he'd pass out. Sam was crying then, softly.

"Hey...I had debts I had to pay back too, right? Things I did that..." Sam nodded.

"Oh, you mean Lilith and the demon blood? No, Sam...That's my fault too."

"How?"

"I was the one who let you out of the panic room the night you ended the demoness. I was the one who allowed you to be led astray by Ruby instead of stopping you from using the demon blood myself. Because I had the power. Sam, power is responsibility and I failed you…"Cas clutched at Sam's collar crying pitifully not wanting to fall down.

Sam was speechless. Cas gulped in more air and let out a shaky, almost girl-child pitched sob.

"And how could I? How could I have been so caught up in angelic duty, in honor that I ignored the mission to protect the one gift God gave Creation that was too much?! How could I when I have never in all my long, long life loved anything or anyone so truly or deeply as I have you and your brother?" Cas caressed Sam's face. Sam swallowed.

"Shh, stop. Please, stop." Sam shook his head as Cas doubled over himself. Sam pressed his hand to Cas' neck. But Cas was not able to stop. He was shaking and wiping his hands over his face. Sam swallowed and pulled Cas over to a settee Dean had set up in the corner. He sat down on it with Cas still in his arms.

"There are two things that we can't do for each other, Sam. I cannot ask you for forgiveness about all those things. And you can't ask me to stop. Don't tell my heart not to break into a million little pieces after everything that you went through. That we put him through…"Cas finally lifted his head and looked over at Dean.

"You know, though, you can make it alright again. You can. Just don't cry anymore. Okay? It's okay. Because you maybe won't ask, but I did forgive you, Cas." Sam swallowed. And Cas smiled.

"Mm, but see, it isn't only grief. I realized how much that I love-"Cas balled his hand into a fist and pressed it to his mouth. Sam understood and nodded.

"Both of you...Too much. And I can't stop. It would be like trying to shove all the blood back into your heart when it comes pouring out of a wound. And if you can't understand that now, after all that you've done for us...For him...I don't know how we can ever be even remotely intact again. Much less whole. Oh, Sam, if you only knew how deep the love in your brother's blood runs. It's like-Imagine if the sun tried to eat itself, to burn itself up to give the darkness light. That's his heart for you...He'd literally do anything to take the memory of that pain away from you and onto himself. And that's why it only hurts me more that I had some part to play in all of it." Cas was chattering, but his voice was falling away into silence. After a while, Sam had no more energy left to try and argue the point with him. Instead, he let him cry against his chest. And he laid back against the settee, hand on Cas' back and he let him cry.

About three hours later, Cas was too weak to cry anymore. And Dean was stirring to wakefulness.

Sam had dozed off. He woke up when he felt Dean tugging at Cas' hand. He kept his eyes closed, pretending to be asleep so he wouldn't have to confront anymore of their pain for just a little while. Perhaps it was selfish but it was too much…

"Hey...You've about bleached his shirt, man. I mean it's drenched. What gives?" Dean pulled Cas up from Sam's chest and onto his knees with him on the floor.

"I-I...Oh God...He brought you home after you...I found you last night when you…"Cas tried to explain.

"You know what's in that miserable little diary of his too, you mean?" Dean swallowed and tried to laugh.

"Dean, I'm sorry….I'm so so sorry."

"For what?"

"Well, it's my-"

"If you say "fault" so help me I will kick your ass." Dean gave Cas a soft shake. Cas stared at Dean stunned. Sam's eyes leaked open watching them without their knowledge.

"Don't you blame yourself. He did what he had to do and no one can take that away from him. That kid. Goes down as a legend every time the sun does. And so do we because of the love and the pain and the royal crazy that made us. Cas, you made us a family again. You did." Dean smiled and started wiping Cas' tear-soaked face with his sleeves.

"Get up and come in the kitchen with me. I need hangover stuff and you-I'm giving you a beer. You don't want a beer, fine, you'll get a beer." Dean smiled. He gave Cas a side hug and in the same motion pulled him to his feet.

Sam was still pretending to sleep like a child might when Dean unbuttoned his tear-soaked shirt and pulled it off of him. He felt Dean wad the shirt up and toss it on the table and then he felt him pull his arms into and zip up one of his own hoodies that had been left down here a few days ago.

He would have said something normally. He'd protest being treated like a baby, but Dean needed to take care of people or he went nuts. And after all that had been dredged up, Sam was the person he needed most in all the world to take care of. So Sam allowed it and allowed himself to take a moment to appreciate it. Like he would when he was little and got sick and Dean did the same thing as this.

"Sleep it off, little brother." Dean's hand ghosted over Sam's face, pushing his hair away from his eyes. Sam smiled, listening to Dean and Cas bicker as they headed toward the kitchen.

Sam laid in the dark in the warmth of the hoodie that Dean had dressed him in and cried. Softly because he was too washed out to cry with any greater fervor. He cried from sadness and the same overpowering realization that Cas had. He cried because he'd just now realized how much he loved his family as he heard them talking in the hallway.

"I mean, that kid better start communicating better or I'm going to make him take a polygraph every freakin' day. It will be on the dinner menu. Steak with a side of polygraph." Dean's flustered planning.

"Well, maybe we only need to be better at listening. Do you need my help? You seem to be walking oddly. You did fall quite hard last night. Do you hurt anywhere?" Cas' more patient, wizened voice. The eldest brother of the three.

"No, I'll be good. I told you, you will have a beer. I don't want to drink myself away by myself, okay? If there's gonna be tears there's gonna be some dang beers. Git yerself in here." The sound of Dean physically hauling Cas down the hallway by his arm and coat. The compliant coat-swishing as Cas went along with it even though he had primordial strength and could flick Dean off like a fly if he'd meant to.

Sam smiled and the tears caught in his teeth. His hands came up and brushed them off his cheeks. He was healed by a lesson learned none too late, by something as mundane as his brothers' constant bickering. Just like falling in love, Sam Winchester the Tormented had fallen asleep.


	5. Chapter 5

**When love hurts in the end**

 **-Tag to Beat the Devil- The chapter title is taken from the song that inspired it. It's called "Out of My Head" by John Newman**

The day came to save Jack and Mom. Sam had never had that much hope, in all their waking years. Dean's hopes were too fragile and his fears too steep to say a word of protest. He dared not let the truths come near him. Love would hurt him in the end. It was all he knew.

He swallowed it down that night when Sam pledged they would die together this time. It couldn't happen any other way. Dean would not survive it a second time. He remembered the last time. The last time Sam had thrown himself into a fire to save his brother and the world. The one and only fire that Dean had not pulled him out of. Dean remembered the pain of the days that followed. The first 16 weeks that ended with Lisa hospitalizing him for alcohol poisoning. Waking up in the hospital forgetting that he even had a brother.

He'd shut out being lonely by stepping outside of his head for a while. Dean had never told Sam. He just kept pushing it down. He remembered.

 _"Do you know me?" Lisa touched Dean's hand._

 _"My girlfriend, I hope?"_

 _"Yes, baby."A strange feeling of hope in her voice. Her shining eyes. This could be any woman that he wanted. Dean didn't care. She was here with him now with his side pain making him like a gutted animal. She was here and that may as well make her an angel._

 _"Do you miss anyone right now, Dean? Is there anything making you sad? You can tell me…"Lisa smiled. Why she had asked that Dean would not remember for a few days._

 _"Honestly, Leese…" Her name came back. "I'm so outta my head right now... how would I know?"_

It wasn't fair to compare his grief to Sam's cage, but he did. Dean knew that his brother's soul had been skinned over and over again by Lucifer's claws. Sam forgot when he'd charged into this Apocalypse world that he and Dean were one soul. That they'd shared a heaven once. That last time when the Apocalypse had hunted them down, they were both tortured in Hell. Dean's hell had just been right there in his apple pie life. Sam fell in a Cage and Dean slipped down a bottle, and both of them were damned.

For all the crap said and done between them, there was one binding cord that Fate would need to cut at the same time if they had any chance of retaining humanity after death. Dean didn't care what happened to him. God, he knew Sam was right. This would end bloody and bad. He just prayed, he begged all of destiny to not let it be the same for Sam.

Sam had forgotten that putting himself in any kind of raw danger was like standing Dean in front of a firing squad.

When that vamp's nest came for Sam, Dean lost every empire that he could have ever built and every gospel ever written. Every time that Dean lost Sam was the same. He was in a broken home alone, no matter how many people were around him. No matter who needed saving or what needed killing, he would have no purpose. No memories to cling to that could bring back the vibrant color of that mutual life.

Dean dragged his own dead body down the road looking for Mary. Had to save Mary or Mom or whoever that woman was to this dead man he had once been. He couldn't remember because he couldn't remember any other love. Why would he love anyone? Love hurt in the end.

Love was like hellfire as he remembered his brother in a thousand smiles. A thousand tears. In heavy fisted fights, and the lonely silence of splitting up, and the laughter and forgiveness of coming back together again.

To shut out feeling lonely, Dean left his head behind in that cave with Sam. He kept walking away from that spot, heedless of the danger he was walking into. He was a tin soldier on the road to another pointless war. There was nothing to fight for. It was just getting by now.

Beaten and broke, he only moved like a puppet to fight the people charging him and the other silhouettes standing around him. He knew that they were Cas and Gabe and Maggie. Friends and people he's saved, maybe. Or ragdolls being escorted by a tin soldier to nothing and nowhere important.

His mother. He saw her finally. She was beautiful. Like a star in the winter sky. And Dean's eyes followed that light, that hope and grace that had been Sam's gospel. Sam's lost gospel and martyrdom by the grace of God.

Dean didn't feel Mary hugging him. She was hugging someone else. An imaginary son in her imaginary world where Sam was still alive. She wasn't hugging the tin soldier who was out of his mind.

"Dean...Where's Sam?" Mary looked up into Dean's face.

And that's when he felt it. The tears running down his imaginary face. His weak paper eyes lifting up to look away back where he came wondering the same thing. The love like hot wax pouring down his paper face, putting a seal on that love letter, that suicide note he was spelling out with expressions. Honestly, all over again, he was so out of his head, how would he know? It hurt. That was all. Love. He understood love only one way. He equated it entirely as it turned around Sam.

No one else understood that. They called it sick or weird or unhealthy. How to explain it? How come they never asked him how he really felt? Even Sam didn't know. His one-world reference and center of gravity came down to the boy he'd pulled from a fire. The truest, purest bond he'd ever known. His family. The love of his life.

Why did he love Sam so much? Why did he keep allowing his heart to collapse under the weight of loving him that much of liking it and needing it to be that way? Love hurt in the end. God, it hurt.

Mary's face moved with whispers of understanding. Dean was caving on the inside all over again.

Into his mind flashed the memory of Lucifer trying to kill him.

 _It's okay, Sammy. I'm here. I'm here. I'm not going to leave you…_

It hurt like that all over again.

 _It's okay, Dean. It's all going to be okay…_

Sam standing at the mouth of the hole, accepting Death. He'd beat the devil.

 _I'm not going to leave you…_

Dean's heart twisted in a coil and bit him like an adder remembering the look in Sam's eyes right before he jumped. Because today he had left him. He'd had no choice. And Sam had died alone. And that loneliness coiled back and twisted around Dean's neck and garoted him for the sin.

Love always hurt him in the end.

 _Here I go again, Sammy…_

Dean felt himself falling. Back down that genie bottle. Back into the oblivion of unnatural plans. Like going after his brother's body. Like dying with him in the dark.

Something that would get him out of his head, so he could forget. But how immense, that love. Beyond what could be forgotten.

His heart twisted and broke like a thousand stained glass windows. Dean was selling his soul again, on Alistair's rack again, in the teeth of Hellhounds again, under Lucifer's fists again, begging for Sam's life in a church again, making a deal with Billie again….Every tragic ending that Dean fell into and every sacrifice that he had ever made bled into his heart again. But he was out of his head and no one was going to ask him how he was. He was a champion when it came to walking on the waves of all the blood his heart kept bleeding.


	6. Chapter 6

**A Few Rare Moments**

Dean had seen impossible things in his life. So many that his sense of the surreal had blurred and he'd learned to accept what he couldn't quite wrap his head around. So when Sam had come back to life against all odds, Dean had embraced his brother and this newly found life they both would have. It just felt natural to accept it.

But after the Exodus, when the rescue of the Apocalypse dwellers had been fully processed, Dean allowed himself to have a few rare moments. He watched alternate versions of old friends making a home here. The quiet bunker was now filled with people. They toasted and celebrated a single day's victory.

Then, Charlie had the idea of building a bonfire out back. If this world was safer, they could have a fire now and not risk angels. Sam had secretly built a fire pit out there a while back, hoping his mother would like it.

Dean was transfixed watching his awkward, living little brother shyly guide New Charlie to the pit. He cleaned it up and lit the firestarter logs and brushwood he'd collected for it. He pulled up one chair for Mary, one for Bobby and one for Charlie.

Dean brought more chairs, eager to help, to be close to his brother's newly found excitement. Charlie started roasting hotdogs over the low flames with a Trickster's stake from a few weeks ago.

Everyone has soon gathered around. Cas showed Charlie to some marshmallows. Bobby brought Mary some spiked cocoa he'd just made out of a Tollhouse tin Sam had bought for Jack.

All the others gathered around, leaving their gear on tables, soaking some of the weapons in Dean's car wash buckets near the firepit. It was almost like a family reunion even though they'd all only met a short time ago.

The others were talking, laughing, some of them even strumming a guitar that had been in the library. Rowena was using spells to make the flames dance with colorful fireworks characters she called "spark dolls". This cheered Jack up a bit and he even let Cas make him a s'more (as per Dean's long ago instructions).

Sam stood leaning against the bunker's back wall, arms folded over his chest as the bitter wind played with his hair. He was smiling to himself at the little fire pit he'd built that now had his whole family seated around it. He almost didn't feel Dean sidle up to him and wrap his arm around his shoulders. With a little cough, he snapped to awareness and turned to look at his brother.

Dean felt his breath cyclone in his chest. It curled up and threaded his heartstrings around it like so much red ribbon. He was sick with so much happiness like one might feel on a roller coaster. The firelight caught Sam's hazel eyes and cast a shadow over his smile. And he was alive.

"You good?" Sam caught Dean as he fell all the way into his grip. Dean had gone weak in the knees.

"I feel like singing crappy show tunes. So, yeah, I think I'm on a high." Dean smiled up into Sam's dancing candle eyes. There was laughter there that hadn't been for a while. Lucifer was trapped in the other world. Dean realized for a rare few seconds that Sam might actually be safe.

"Well, you look like beat out hamburger crap." Sam snickered. Dean stood up again and clapped one hand on either of Sam's shoulders pushing him flush to the wall.

"If you ever go again…"Dean's voice dropped an octave, struggling to keep from yelling at Sam in frustration. The big brother felt a sudden surge of warmth that passed to his heels. Sam's smile was bubbly with bitten back mischief.

"What?" Dean was about to laugh now too, why he didn't know. Maybe he didn't need another reason. Living eyes were looking back at him. Breathing lips were smiling his way. What other excuses would he need to feel this giddy?

"I told you. When it's time for the final time we go, it will be together." Sam reached out a hand that he'd cupped like he meant to feed a lamb. He tucked it under Dean's chin, letting his thumb wander over his brother's lips for a moment. Dean felt his jaw tremble slightly under the steadiness of that gentle hand. Sam was about to say something else when firecracker laughter sounded from the fire.

"Dean, help!" Cas was laughing wildly, cheeks turned rosy from heat and embarrassment. He had a new s'more he was making for Mary on the end of a stake and he'd caught it on fire.

"It's okay, Cas. I like bread toasted really crispy!" Mary was chewing her nails laughing. Jack had turned blue in the face he was trying so hard not to laugh and thus keep his sour expression.

"Dean, Sam, please! I have so little experience!" Cas was swinging the blazing s'more around and Charlie, laughing wildly, continued to dodge it.

"Come on, Dean. Let's go keep Cas from melting the yard." Sam laughed as his fingers slid away from Dean's chin. Dean had no idea why but that brief moment with Sam's fingers on his face felt like being kissed by his first crush ever. It was all the love he'd need to forgive him for dying. He smiled.

A rare few moments of laughing and teaching Cas (for the third time) to make a s'more brought Dean's soul back from the desert Sam's death had wrapped around it. And that night, when he laid down in his bed, he laughed himself to sleep.


	7. Chapter 7

**Heaven and Hell**

 **Named for the song and alluded to lyrics by Black Sabbath that Dean's listening to.**

Dean was free now so he should be happy. That's what all the shining eyes and smiles were saying.

But he had been reckless and a bit of an idiot lately. An idiot for saying yes to Michael and an idiot for taking on reckless plans all on his own.

An idiot with a heart flooding over with heaven and hell and all the high water of the tears he couldn't cry right now. He had done it all for love. Love that had blinded him, that lost him and saved him.

He'd said "yes" because how could he say "no"? What choice did he have when Sam was in the hands of the Devil? If he had to choose again, he would do what he'd done again, to save Sam. Always for Sam. Heaven and Hell and high water for Sam. Oh, well, what could he do? He was over his head with the overwhelming power of that bond. On and on and on with this mutual self-sacrifice. This crazy idiot love between brothers that had killed them both and brought them back like some Cosmic joke that never struck its punchline.

Dean's heart was clenching in his chest again. That love was so intense it was constantly painful. He reached for his iPod, placed the headphones on his head. He was half out of the body when he switched the song over to a Black Sabbath tune that embodied his life's anthem, so he thought.

He laid there listening on and on to the theme song of his life. The night grew blacker yet and the bunker retained the ambiance of a sanctuary. Here they were. Perpetually, the Winchesters. Caught between the wars of Heaven and Hell.

Dean laid there with the music swimming around in his head. He let his mind roam through his home while he lay in his bed. These were the golden halls of letters, the place he'd come to claim and keep. It was always the mystic, half out of reach and yet it kept him close in comfort. The moon and the sun were hung above him, so great was his elation to have finally found this place. Moon and sun were equal now because of the one constant in this newfound life that had not changed. That had been given back to him over and over again, sacrifice after sacrifice.

Sam.

Dean couldn't take it anymore. He'd tried to drown it out, but the need got louder and louder. It was childish and stupid. And he couldn't help it. He'd needed this for years. The last time he'd even allowed himself to think about it they were little kids.

It was around 2 am by the time Dean crept to Sam's room. He rapped on it once. There was no answer. But the door wasn't locked.

Dean pushed the door open and closed it shut in one motion. He figured that Sam would want to know what the heck he was doing in here. He pushed the headphones off his head, drawing a deep breath to explain. But how was he going to explain this sudden vulnerability that he'd delayed acting on for decades? How to explain what the song that was winding around in his head meant to him? What his brother meant to him. How sorry he was that he was acting this way when Sam and Sam alone could truly understand Dean's constant struggle with Heaven and Hell.

The words caught in Dean's throat. Fool, oh what a fool. How would he make himself look weak and childlike again to his brother who had spent a decade and an eternity in the shadow of Heaven and Hell's personal vendetta? Was he really gonna whine to this guy who had suffered more than he cared to imagine and-He shook himself. Stupid! It was stupid. But he'd wanted this badly enough for so many years that he couldn't help it. Maybe Sam wouldn't make fun of him later. With a huff, he locked the door behind him and looked up at last at Sam's room.

Dean crept into the darkness, not having expected to find it mostly dark in here. There was a candle lit on his bedside desk, burning down and burning out. Dean realized it smelled like some kind of spell spice that Sam might be using to ward his room extra from some night bumping being. Soundly tucked into his own room, but not safe. No, never safe. Not after Heaven and Hell had their way. Dean caught a hoarse little croak from escaping him.

In the light of said candle, Dean could see Sam laying on his back in the bed. He had his iPod in his hand.

Dean laughed. There was no way this could be the case. But the screen on Sammy's iPod also said Heaven and Hell by Black Sabbath.

Dean crept to the edge of Sam's bed, nudging his hand. Sam stirred out of music-induced dozing. His eyes flickered in the candlelight. Dean held up the screen to his iPod to show him the coincidence that was anything but. Sam's teeth reflected the candlelight then as he smiled.

"What the-? How'd we manage to make the same random mullet rock choice at 2 in the morning?" Sam's voice was soft with sleepiness, innocent again in Dean's vulnerable ears. Then, Dean drew in a sharp breath, twisting his lips to the side in a little smirk. How long would it be before Sam asked him why the Hell he'd broken into his room this late at night?

Sam looked up at him, blinking in the dark. His eyes adjusted and then the tender smile on his face said he wasn't going to ask. Because he already knew why Dean had come. Of course, what a fool. Dean should have known. Touchy feely Sam had probably been longing for something like this for years and years himself. But neither one of them were going to make the first move to suggest this was what was needed to heal them both.

Dean laughed at himself and cringed apologetically. Sam held his arms open. With a soft huff, tired of resisting this, childish though it be, Dean climbed into bed with Sam and laid his head on his brother's chest. Sam sniffed back a snicker, as the inflated machismo of his big brother finally let down its fences.

He pressed his face into Dean's hair and laid his hand between his shoulder blades. Dean swallowed a laugh and closed his eyes, letting himself enjoy the feeling of Sam's hand on his aching back. Now that he was here, he wondered why they had danced around each other their whole adult lives about this? As much Heaven and Hell as they'd been through with and for each other, why did it matter if they reverted to their childhood anxiety bed sharing habit once in a while?

Sam nuzzled Dean's hair for a second, leaning up and snuffing the candle with his fingertips. Dean winced. Sam hadn't bothered to lick his fingers first. Maybe he didn't feel fire like the rest of them? Why would he? He'd burned in Hell for so, so long. Longer than Dean had done to save him. Alone there in the dark, possessed by Satan and then suddenly not but rather tortured by him after. And all of that for the love of his brother and trying to save the world from a mess he'd had a hopeless hand in, without meaning to. Just like Dean was now.

"This pose...Was the other way around, when we were little." Dean muttered it almost to himself. He leaned up to look at Sam as he felt a soft chuckle pass through him. He wasn't going to apologize for reminiscing either.

"Well, I was smaller back then. Fit right under your arm. And you weren't so broken." Sam sighed. His hand crept up Dean's back and rested at the base of his neck, thumb brushing over the hair at the base of his scalp. Dean was almost moved to tears. How in all of Heaven and Hell could one gentle hand set all things right with a single touch?

"We both were a lot less broken then…" Dean swallowed and reached around Sam, taking his free hand in a clenched fist and bringing it to rest near his heart. Sam smiled, opening the hand Dean was holding within the confines of his fingers and pressing his palm to Dean's chest and their twined fingers together by the tips. Dean's tortured heartbeat was slowing to a steadier pace under Sam's tapping tempo index finger that had found the music in their shared pulse. They'd be sleeping soon.

"Least you know where you left the pieces of you...How to fit them together when it doesn't make sense anymore…"Sam was half asleep when he said it, but Dean understood. Their lives were a mosaic of Heaven and Hell. A bridge of broken pieces that had put them close to God.

Dean rolled over until they were in each other's arms. He leaned up and kissed both sides of Sam's face, falling asleep with his forehead pressed to Sam's throat, having listened to his breath at its source for a chance at sleep.

Mary had been sleepless last night. She had seen Dean go into the room, but said nothing to the wiser when both of the brothers emerged from Sam's room the next morning, hair ruffled and eyes shining with this shared smile like they were both keeping an innocent secret they would never be able to put words to admit to anyway.

Mary alone understood the secret, having remembered when the toddler version of Dean used to climb into Sam's crib in the nights long ago before Heaven and Hell had taken what they would. She went away by herself and cried into her coffee, tears of happiness, that some little threads of innocence, some finite pieces of the brothers her babies were alive and teething yet at the hearts of these good men.


	8. Chapter 8

**Over the Moon-**

Cas was worried about how Dean would do, coming back from his ordeal. But the nights that followed Sam's intervention into his big brother's isolation were enough to heal him. His eyes blossomed with their own light again. And he was more willing to go on cases if the "Chief" asked him to.

The first time that Sam, Dean, Cas, and Jack decided to leave the bunker on a minor hunt so that Jack could practice things, Cas was terrified. How would Dean do with Cas and Jack tagging along? He was still pretty vulnerable and that was something he only normally handled well in Sam's exclusive presence.

Cas had never resented this, of course. Sam had been there with Dean at the beginning of life and was the thread that wove the whole together. Sometimes, though, the angel wished his best friend would open his heart up to him more. It felt a bit intrusive to read his silent pain through the prayers he was not aware that his heart constantly made.

It was late at night. They were hunting a werewolf that needed a full-moon to transform. They were driving down a highway in the pitch black. Jack was cranky, bored and sleepy. And then Dean, mischief suppressed for so long, had an idea. His eyes were lightning bugs and shot off grassroots and sparks in one fiery night of the world.

"Heya, Sammy? Remember when you were learning to tie your hunting boots like Jack here? The first time we went after a werewolf and you were allowed to come?" Dean looked at Sam. Sam had his finger raised, arguing with Jack over the moral purpose of their job for the thirteenth time today.

"Oh, yeah, and you seriously PO'ed Dad with the werewolf hunting theme song?" Sam's mouth snapped shut, finger curling downward as he gave up his argument. Whatever the memory was, it was pleasant enough that he forgot mid-sentence whatever he and Jack had been bickering about.

"What? What does that have to do with the bigger picture here?" Jack whined in irritation. Sam leaned back and smiled at him.

"Oh, you probably wish you hadn't asked that, bud." Sam winked at Jack and then smiled at Cas, patting his knee.

"I'm sorry for this in advance," he whispered through a cringing smile that made him look like a little boy again, if only in his eyes. Cas felt a smile's warm glimmer across his face like welding dust, painfully conducive of some new memory being made. He was smiling, because he could sense that this was one of those moments again. One where Sam and Dean Winchester were alone in their car, up against angels and demons and destiny again. Cas grabbed at Jack's shoulder, unaware that the prospect of this was actually exciting.

"Ha! And I've still got the tape!" Dean pulled a cassette that said, "The Police" on the band of it out of his glove box. Sam clapped his hands together in one balled fist motion that seemed to be more for keeping the beat than celebrating what may be a ritual between them.

 _Walking on the Moon_ suddenly blared over the radio. Dean raised his voice to sing over the song's real lyrics, words he'd made up for the werewolf hunting anthem:

 _Sasquatch steps are what you take! Walkin' on the moon!_

And Sam, to Cas and Jack's surprise responded singing with pop star enthusiasm:

 _Better hope your neck don't break, when I get done with you!_

 _-_ And Dean came back with-

 _If Dad could see your hair now! Walking on the moon!_

 _Quaker state oatmeal guy, walking on the moon_ …Dean looked back and winked at Cas, who was rolling with quiet laughter now. How long had he known them and still had never heard this of this weird ritual before?

A string of continued nonsense lyrics followed with Dean:

 _This could take forever! Walking on the moon-_

And then Sam:

 _Still stuck livin' togethaaa-walking on the moon!_

And a string of more nonsense where Jack finally leaned up in between them, laughing until the tip of his nose was red. Cas covered his mouth, laughing so hard he felt like he might be about to throw up.

"What...The...Heck?!" Jack ran a hand through his hair, choking on giggles.

Sam's breath stopped in the middle of gathering air for a new lyric.

"This is the Werewolf Hunting Anthem. The first time we hunted one that required a full lunar cycle, I was a kid, maybe 12. I was cranky like you've been. My Dad was really ticked at me, so Dean put in this tape and made up random lyrics to make the song relevant to the hunt to shut us both up." Sam grinned.

 _Some may say, I'm wishing my days away, But I say! Thank God, you shaved!__ Dean reached out and started fondling Sam's chin, tapping his finger on his nose.

"It's like a wittle naked mole rat. So adorable…" Dean's voice took on a teasingly patronizing tone, gripping Sam's cheeks where his lips made a fish shape. Cas and Jack were crying with laughter as Sam struggled against Dean's fingers, spluttering in amused irritation. He got free at last and took a swat at the back of Dean's head.

"Ah!" Dean laughed, huffing annoyance.

"The road, dude!" Sam held his hands up in mock surrender.

"Jack, Cas...Please tell this guy to never grow a beard again." Dean whistled low in his throat. Then he looked at Sam, lips forming a pout.

"Please for your afflicted big brother, please don't grow a beard again. You looked like a pedo sketchy candy van guy."

"What the hell, Dean?" Sam was laughing now, bowing his face in his hands.

Jack fell back in the seat then, propelled by the forward lurch of the car. Dean had seen the werewolf step out into the street and hit the gas.

"Whoa now! Steady, Dean." Cas reached out and put a hand on Dean's shoulder as he stepped on it, for a split second fearing the worst had happened in Dean's momentarily fragile mind.

The feeling of the wheel grip going up Dean's strong arm gave Cas some confidence. He had been through so much. Cas remembered the first time he'd taken Dean by this shoulder and felt his hand burn with Dean's hell scorched flesh. He felt the smile curl around Dean's lips as he felt Cas' calm restraint check him. And Cas knew, with the mischief still dancing in Dean's eyes that he was okay. They looked into the rear view mirror, making contact with Cas' eyes in the reflection. The torment that used to say _Don't try to save me_ now said I _t's okay I'm home_.

Cas then saw Sam's eyes lift up, looking on in concern when he'd heard Cas. Cas smiled at him. Between the laughter and the hunt's adrenaline, he felt them. Their silent burning prayers. His little brothers made secure in the bond between them that spanned torment and decades. Cas nodded and leaned back.

"See, Jack. Times flies when you don't whine." Dean nodded to Jack who had watched the whole exchange with renewed wonder. He was beaming now, sharing a speed drunk smile with Sam. The four of them had bonded more in that peculiar moment than any chick flick episodes of the recent past. It was the first time the curtain truly peeled back for the Nephilim boy, showing his dads in the light of their youth, making them equivalent to where he was now. And somehow, at that moment, in that silly trivial moment, their bond was over the moon.


	9. Chapter 9

**How Long Will I Love You?**

 _Name of the chapter is after the song of the same name originally by Waterboys but listen to the Ellie Goulding version as that was the version that inspired this chapter._

The werewolf was killed and the day was done. They were too far away from the main road to go back into town before sun up and they were all beat. So, Dean had the wild idea to camp there on the beach of a lake. They were in upstate Michigan.

All the excitement of the last few hours had changed Jack's mood from enraptured giddiness to curious sadness. Dean was building a fire out of driftwood. Cas had set up a tent and laid out some sleeping bags. Sam was setting out some gear to clean in lake water as well as a few tins of canned meat so they could cook a late night supper.

Jack was idle, sitting on a log seat, staring up into the oblivion of the stars. Suddenly, his sadness overtook him. Sam looked up, startled when Jack burst into tears.

"You okay, buddy?" Sam sat down next to Jack and put an arm around him. Dean looked up at Cas. Cas sucked his teeth, watching Dean's fretful eyes. Here his whole family was, fearful and fragile. How could he help them?

"It's just...I'm sorry, but...You were talking about your Dad and memories of when you were kids and then...I thought about my grandparents and my mother and I-I want my mother back. The memories we didn't get to have!" Jack bowed his head. Sam looked like he'd been stabbed. And then, he pulled Jack to his chest.

"You know somethin'? I lost someone I should have had a future with once too…."Sam held his breath.

"You mean Mary? But you got to meet her after a while." Jack scrubbed at his tears. Dean looked up from what he was doing. Cas tilted his head in curiosity wondering who Sam was about to mention. Dean held his breath. He already knew.

"No...No, when I was young, I went to a college. Standford...The one in California? And I met this girl...This...beautiful girl. Her name was Jessica." Sam smiled. Jack looked up in wonder. Cas gathered closer.

"You've never mentioned her before?" Cas sat down on the log, watching Sam in wonder. Dean dropped a heavy pile of wood next to the fire.

"That goes to show how beautiful she was and how much it hurt when she died." Dean hadn't known her either, but he could say that with confidence. He'd laid eyes on her once. That was enough to love her.

Sam looked up at his brother, near to tears now. Jack watched him in wonder. Then, he looked back at Jack.

"You have to understand, Jack...Jess was more than just a girl I met...She was the most special, most beautiful girl that I have ever known." Sam held his breath. Jack's tears were coming in heavier now, noticing the look of indescribable pain in his adopted father's eyes.

"You loved her?" Jack held his breath.

"Oh, yes. Very much. In fact, I still do. I would have married her, you know. We would have had a family. I even shopped for rings…"Sam smiled, biting his lip. He took Jack's shoulders. Dean sat down next to Cas. Cas spluttered mouthing the name "Jessica" silently wondering why on earth Sam had never talked about her. For a moment, Cas felt like he really didn't know his friends all that well.

"You know, Jessica...She was a lot like you. She was very curious and smart and wanted to help anyone she could-"Sam's voice cracked and he let his hand go up to Jack's face.

"She told me once that she wanted to have kids someday. She asked me, 'what if we got married? What if we had kids, like forever from now?'..."Sam bit his lip and closed his eyes as his other hand came up to Jack's opposite cheek and thumbed away a tear.

"She said,'Sam if I ever had a son, you know what I'd name him? After my grandpa. Jack.'." Sam opened his eyes and the pain smoldered there, searing like the Hellfire he'd stepped out of. Jack's jaw dropped.

"When you were born, I remembered...I remembered and I thought to myself. 'Well, Sam here's a second chance.'. You never had a Mom and I...I never became the father of Jessica's son.' Sam swallowed and smiled. Jack nodded, understanding. And Sam pushed Jack to his chest. He put his hand in his hair. He was avoiding Dean's face because his jaw had dropped understanding the bond Sam had made with Jack better now.

"She used to ask me, "guess? How long am I gonna love you?'" Sam laughed. Jack swallowed and closed his eyes.

"And what was the answer?"

"As long as there are stars above you…" Sam looked up at the stars and laughed. Jack followed his gaze.

"See, Jack...It's like I told you once. You have to have hope that there's somewhere better for us when we leave this world. Somewhere without sadness...pain. You have to hope that it's true. Your Mom and my Jess...Somewhere past all this the ones who slip away can still hold on forever. Sometimes their wishes, their prayers...Their love. Sometimes it gives you a second chance. My Jess wanted a son...And one day, forever from then, you were born. And you maybe weren't her son, but you are mine. And she was mine. So in a way, her dream came true…" Sam lifted Jack's face and wiped the tears from his eyes with the sleeve cuffs.

"They go on loving, they live through us. Make those memories that you lost through your new family...Do it for your Mom if you can't do it with her. And I promise, as long as there are stars above you...she'll see...and she'll be proud, Jack. She'll be proud.' Sam stood up. He crept in the center of the circle. Dean shook his head, horrified that Sam had never told him this before when they fought over him.

"Be careful, too. There was something else Jess used to say to me. When I asked her what I'd do without her? She said 'you'll crash and burn'. And one day...one day when I forgot about the people who loved me and the lesson she gave me….That's exactly what I did." Sam held his breath. And then, he bowed his head and walked away, down the shore, away far out of their sight down the shoreline of the lake. The silver moon stood out behind him, a lamp to guide his path until he was clean gone from their sight.

The others sat in silence contemplating what he'd said.

Jack gasped.

"What...What does that mean?" Jack bit his fingernails. And then, Dean felt his heart sink. They never had told Jack what Lucifer had really done to Sam. Dean looked at Cas who was holding his breath. Cas nodded to Dean to go after Sam.

"I...I'm gonna go find Sammy….You and Cas should probably talk about it."Dean stood up slowly, legs suddenly weak.

Sam...Oh, why hadn't he opened up before? So much pain that could have been spared.


	10. Chapter 10

**The Last Day on Earth:**

 _ **The name of this chapter was named after the song of the same name by Kate Miller-Heidke that inspired it. Some of the text in this chapter reflects this song. Look up the song to better understand.**_

Dean followed a ribbon of moonlight. This light was a blade turning in his belly piercing his feet with every step he took.

Sam stood on a stone, looking out over the night and the lake. The solitude swallowed him. Replaying every conversation and every hallucination that had ever happened since the day that Jessica had died and sent his life straight to Hell.

And Dean ached and ached inside. Because he understood what it was to lose the love of one's life. He had just watched it happened not more than a few weeks ago. A love of a different kind that had broken him so many different ways.

Dean came and stood beside Sam on the stone. They stared at the moon in silence for a long time. And then Sam drew a deep breath.

"Do you know what it feels like? To remember someone like that...And every hour that you wasted in denial that you still miss them. That every time their name is spoken you die a little bit again." Sam swallowed. Dean let out a shudder. Sammy's words took the thoughts straight out of Dean's head and blew them like sparks over the water.

"I only ever loved one person like that. It was different for me than it was with you. If it was the same for me, it would have been weird." Dean shoved his hands in his pockets.

"Who was it?" Sam licked his lips, head tilting a bit to the side. Dean felt a sudden stab of wonder. With that lead, really? How did he still not know?

"You."

There was sudden echoing silence. Dean swallowed. Oh, how he ached and ached and ached inside. That Sam could still not know how many times he'd grieved for him over the years. That some of the wrong done between them was because of that unresolved grief.

Sam suddenly turned to his brother, lips rounded in an expression of absolute shock.

"I remember it was the last day on earth….It was the end of the world. The ground below us crumbling and collapsing. You fell like a stone, right out of my world. And I remember another time when the world was ending again and the stars or angels fell straight out of the sky. Over and over again, something happened that brought the planet to its knees, and you were always somehow at the center of it. You were always the scapegoat walking off that cliff, paying for it-I don't know why!

I remember sleepwalking and dreaming that you would come back to me when the dust had settled when the smoke had cleared…" Dean swallowed. Sam's lips trembled. Dean nodded slowly.

"You know, the first time I lost you...It maybe took a year, but...It killed me in the end. That's what I did without you...I crashed and I burned too. Losing you sent me straight to Hell." Dean swallowed. Because now that the words were coming out, he wanted to keep them in. They were scary and they hurt.

"And the second time I lost you, I spent a year...Living some lie. Some pretend apple pie life that you made me do...And I did it for you because I promised. And I was too proud to say that it was a fake perfect ending because it felt too weird to call it what it was. That I had lost the love of my life ...But to be fair, calling it that would have been next to impossible because of how creepy that it probably sounds. But that's what I did. I put all those dreams in a box with the Devil forever...That I'd be dying alone...I couldn't deal with the thought and I still can't." Dean sucked his teeth. He closed his eyes. The light of the moon engulfed them, all white, all holy fire. Sam let a shuddering breath, unnerved to his core. Dean couldn't bring himself to look at him, but the words were coming out now after all these years, and he couldn't stop them.

"It hurt, every time you came back to me. It hurt like dying because I knew that I'd be digging a grave again. And next time would hurt worse than the time before. Hope getting twisted up in the trick that was our jacked up life. It hurt like the next time you decided to freaking die for me, and I watched your insides bleed right out of your mouth with every trial you up and decided to carry on your own. I would do some pretty stupid things, some hurtful things to buy more chances. Anything to keep from going through that again. And I loved to lose my mind because it was easier than that…" Dean bit his lip.

"Every second chance…It hurt like dying because it was so much wild freaking happiness on top of the fresh dirt of the grave I'd just dropped my guts in-again." Dean shook his head. Sam was struggling to breathe, eyes half closed. Dean nodded and took him by the collar, making him look into his eyes.

"I'll be damned if, after all you've said, I didn't dig that grave up again recently. I-I you were gone again. The world ended all over again. So, hell yeah, I know what it feels like. I am a friggin' expert on what that feels like. So much so that I said yes to a freaking nut job angel to keep it from happening again…So much so that I would rather cut my insides out and fry them for breakfast than ever have to do that _ever_ again." Dean had surprised himself. He bit down on his lip. It would probably be bruised tomorrow.

Sam's eyes fluttered and he shook his head. He looked up at the moon, then he looked back at Dean. He let a deep breath and he shook his head.

"I-I uh… I don't know how to respond to that. I mean, you've never opened up to me-not like that... before." Sam shook his head again, looking at his feet, blinking. Dean swallowed and nodded.

"Just say you'll look out for yourself." Dean sucked his teeth, waiting for Sam to say something. He was struggling with himself. Dean could see that.

"But I can't just say that because...Because see that's how I survived losing her. I loved her-God, I _love_ her. And I will never "not" love her. It's why even if I wanted to, I won't be settling down. That spot was hers but even she...She wasn't the love of my life. And that...That felt like weird to say because well...The way that sounds it would be very hard for someone to understand because it doesn't mean what it sounds like. And by the time I was ready to tell you that you… Well, you know...It's just...it wasn't right to try to open up to you because of all the crap I'd pulled and-"Sam shook his head, face wrinkled with pain now…

"I mean, I never realized that you...After I fell-"

"You've got to freaking be kidding me. If you say that you didn't realize I would what-! _Grieve_ for you?! I just might throw your ass in the freaking lake. Hell yeah, I grieved for you! You took a freaking swan dive into Hell-and at the time I thought it was forever and-Look at me." Dean took Sam's shirt again. Sam was blinking, eyes so dull from the sudden stroke of grief that they looked like fish eyes.

"But...When I died...We weren't brothers anymore. Not at the time." Sam shook his head. Dean grappled his shoulder so hard Sam let out a soft cry of pain. Dean made him look at him, startled though he was by the dead look in Sam's eyes.

"We may have had words and issues back then, and a few times since. But if you ever say that again, I will kick your ass from here to the dark side of the moon and back. Capisce?

Now you look at me and understand something. I don't do this opening up stuff because when the words are on my lips its like chugging battery acid. Get it? It freaking hurts to talk about what you mean to me because you mean that much. I grieved for you, Sam. I went nuts grieving for you. And I have chest pain to this day sometimes. I lie awake at night grieving for you and you're alive at the moment. I _hurt_ for you because you've gone through all this crap and you thought..." Dean bowed his head, lips twisting in a grimace. Unbelievable.

"What...What do you mean that you have chest pain?" Sam's face had blanched. Dean smiled, feeling a more gentle emotion overtake him now. This would be okay. He could open up to him if it made him feel better.

"I mean that I had a heart condition after you fell. I was grieving for you so hard that I had to go on some kind of medicine to keep me from having a heart attack. Which I abused by mixing enough alcohol to knock out a Golem with it. Lisa put me in the hospital for some kind of organ failure like 3 times before you came back." Dean bit his lip at the look of shock that thrilled over Sam's horrified face.

"And sometimes when I get to thinking about stuff between you and me...My whole body hurts, Sam. You've got to understand. If something happens to you again, it will literally kill me in every sense of the term. It always does. So promise that we will actually die together next time." Dean swallowed.

Sam's bottom lip trembled and he shook his head.

"You-You were so bad off that you…" Sam bowed his head, blinking in horror.

"I didn't tell you that so you'd feel bad. But look here, kiddo, I literally pulled you out of a fire at the beginning of your life. And that's what set the tone…"Dean frowned. Sam was pale and looked like he'd be sick.

"You good? Wanna go back now?" Dean rubbed Sam's shoulder. Sam looked up at Dean, eyes shooting sparks now with life.

Sam smiled at Dean. He drew a shaky breath and then he laughed softly, amazed by what he'd been told. Dean nodded and smiled. Sam grabbed Dean's coat and held onto it for a moment.

"Mm….Yeah, okay, yeah...I think...I'm tired. I...Damn! Let's go back."

"Yes, let's." Dean wrapped his arm around Sam's shoulders and they plodded back in the direction of the fire.

Cas and Jack sat near the fire in horrified silence. Cas had told Jack the truth. Judging by how green around the mouth the boy was, he was still processing it.

Everyone smiled awkwardly at Sam. Sam went to his sleeping bag and collapsed in it. He didn't move a muscle again until the morning light washed over his face.


	11. Chapter 11

**Breathe No More:**

 **AU_Spoilers for early S14:**

 **Chapter inspired by Breathe No More by Evanescence**

Sam hadn't known that Jack was sick until his sickness was a nightmare thing. And by that time, Sam realized that he also was sick. That he was sick on the inside. No one and nothing could reach him, because this was his second chance and he was losing it. He was losing him, so it looked.

He cared for him. But didn't he care for him? He stood in the bathroom mirror crying his eyes out as he washed the blood from his hands. He'd just fed him. Or he'd tried. The drink, the water, the stubborn child had barely taken a sip off of it.

Sam was crying and he'd bit his lip. Blood was streaming from his mouth. No, he'd punched the mirror. And for a second, there in the blood, there with his own mocking eyes looking back, he was standing in a thousand mirrors of the past.

 _We break his mind._ Lady Beville's voice came back like the ghost of every demon he'd ever cast out. Of course, that was the point, wasn't it? That was always the prize wasn't it?

Lucifer's real face was smiling back at him in the glass. Like he'd done all those years ago when he'd tried to drive him into battle.

"Hey, kid. Remember we got work to do…"Lucifer winked.

"You're dead…"Sam shook his head.

"So are you, champ…"Lucifer's eyes started crying blood. No, not Lucifer. Bloody Mary.

"No...We killed you too…"Sam was shaking. Was that her tears or his glass?

"You killed them...Everyone you ever loved…"Sam saw Jessica's face burning in the glass along with him-courtesy of Lady Beville's hallucinations that had continued after her torture stopped. He tried to touch his Jessica and it cut him, it bit up into his fingers and his wrist. He croaked as blood from his wrist drained into the sink. He was crying now.

"Why won't you die?" Dean's voice from the hallucination.

"Because you deserve to…"Lucifer.

"You're dead."

"So are you. And then you'll be with me. And then-what I'm gonna do to you...For what you did to our son?"

"Our son?" Sam choked on the thought of the implication. Lucifer laid his head back laughing, laughing and his laughter was all around him.

"Can't be ours because we never...You lost your virginity to Kelly Kline so we never…"Sam blinked, frightened by the idea.

"Mm, maybe...But your body and your soul and everything else belongs to me now...Your souls over here on the other side with me now...So I own you...And sooner than later you'll be with me in Hell-again. Round and round...And I'll torture you like you can't even conceive for letting our son go like this…"Lucifer clicked his teeth.

"Shut up!" Sam punched the glass again. Pieces of mirror stabbed into his neck now. He hissed. Blood was welling up from him in all places.

He'd broken the sink. The water shot up from it soaking him wet and cold. He was in that shower again, in Lady Beville's dungeon.

 _No one can take that much pain and not break. No one…_

"GAH!" Sam screamed. And they were right. They were all so right.

He was breaking now. Breaking now like the porcelain sink he'd torn out of the wall, stabbing into his kneecaps. He slipped in the mess of himself, and cut into his legs. He sobbed as blood rolled down him, soaking him along with the water and the burning sensation of a wall that had crumbled into tiny pieces long ago but was cutting him wide open with the razor snowflakes.

Lacerations made him slip as he tried to flop like a fish on the sand out of the bathroom. He heard Jack calling his name. Jack needed him, but he couldn't get to him.

Sam wasn't sure how much longer he could do this. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't breathe, and soon he'd slip back into the devil's grasp again. He'd never escape him no matter what. And now...now he had failed everyone he'd ever loved because he was that broken…

"Wait, hold on, bud. We're coming." Dean ran into the room across from this bathroom. Jack was there, coughing, exasperated.

"What is it, Jack? What do you need? Anything at all…"Cas' summer rain voice. Cooling the moment.

Jack's wailing coughs. Sam groaned…

 _JACK! NO, JACK! God, please!_

This was the one loss Sam Winchester the Tormented would not survive. Lucifer may have been his constant tormentor, but Jack had siphoned all the light and good that his father ever was before he fell. He was the morning star.

"It's Sam!" Sick as he was, Jack had one thought. The first person he'd ever so openly and honestly admitted love to, of course. Yes, Cas and Dean were both his Dads as well, but Sam had been "father" from first sight.

"What about Sam?" Dean's voice raised in terror. Jack tried to get up and get to the bathroom.

"He's in there...The bathroom across from my room. He locked himself in there...He...I coughed on him. My blood…He...Is he okay? I think I upset him maybe…"Jack coughed.

Dean came to the bathroom door.

"Sammy! Open the door, man. Are you okay?" Dean leaned against the door.

 _Dean, help me...I can't,...I can't…._

Sam laid down, face down in the broken porcelain.

"Cas, I hear running water...Your gonna have to break in."

The door was ripped away from its hinge after a moment. Dean was on his knees next to Sam before Sam realized that real-time had passed.

"What the Hell?! Sammy…." Dean hissed through chattering teeth. Sam felt himself being lifted up in slippery hands, hands tar sticky with his own blood…

"Is he? Cas, please tell me he's not-"Dean let in a shuddering resigned breath and choked, gulping back at horror as he laid his face in Sam's blood-soaked hair. The next thing Sam felt was Cas' gentle hands on his chest, healing him. His eyes fluttered open.

"Sam? What on earth?" Cas plucked several shards of glass and porcelain free from Sam's skin as he lay there shivering in Dean's arms.

"I-I didn't mean to hurt myself. I'm sorry, it's just….He's just...I lost my cool I...I can't...I can't take it...Anymore…."Sam's teeth chattered. Cas' eyes crinkled with concern. Dean was the color of a newspaper.

"I-I just...I don't know...What you want from me…."

"We don't want anything from you but for you to be okay?" Cas tilted his head. Dean let out a gasp.

"He doesn't mean us…"Dean was shaking now. And suddenly, suddenly Cas understood. And he burst into tears.

"Oh, no. No, I'm not him, Sam! No, he's dead now, Sam. You're safe from him now…."Cas ran his hands through Sam's hair. Sam reached up and took Dean's shirt in his hands. He would barely look at Cas mistaking him for the unholy angel who only ever caused him hurt.

"So much blood...I never meant...Why don't you just let me die, already? I never meant...So much blood…"Sam was gnashing his teeth.

"Go help Jack. I've got him…"Dean gripped Cas' arm. Cas nodded. Then, Dean turned his full attention to Sam.

"Sam? Hey, buddy….Look up here at me...It's Dean. It's your Dean. Not 9 years ago...Not in Hell…It's just Dean..."Dean lifted Sam to where he was looking at him square in the face.

"But how do I know? It would be just like him to create a life like this and take it...To make a child like that and kill him...And I...I can't...Dean, I can't…"Sam shook his head.

"No, but I can...It's okay. My turn, Sammy. My turn. Let me carry you." Dean pulled Sam into his arms.

"Where's Sam? I wanna see Sam. Is he okay? I thought I heard something break." Jack sounded distressed. Cas could be heard in the other room.

"He's...He sometimes...After what we told you...Sometimes Sam gets sick too...In his mind...Sometimes he sees things that aren't real and it confuses and upsets him. Give him a minute. He'll come to you. I promise." Cas was so reassuring Sam even from the dazed place he was in he almost believed him.

Dean took Sam's face. Sam thought that he should breathe no more. There was no way he could make his lungs work. Cas may have stopped the bleeding and saved his life, but he was still drowning on dry land. He and his brother knelt in the shattered porcelain of their broken lives. Of all the times both hopes and dreams were dashed like this in the broken bones of their beloved dead people….

"Dean, if he...I can't…"Sam was shivering. Dean nodded.

"We'll figure it out….Listen here...You can't go on without him? He won't survive this without you. And me and Cas would rather assume eat angel killing bullets than for something like this ridiculous crap to happen to you again. Little brother...I'm here. Cas is here. Jack's still here...You're really here with us. We'll make it work, buddy…"Dean kissed Sam's head firmly on his scalp, shuddering when he got a mouthful of blood. Sam groaned.

"I'm sorry...Did I upset him? When can I see him?" Jack's voice.

"Oh God! Help me get up…"Sam scrambled. Dean lifted him. Sam sputtered, trying to find an explanation for his appearance.

"He needs you now. You're just gonna have to do the best you can. But I'm right here." Dean took Sam's hand holding him up. Sam nodded. Dean helped him climb out of the demolished sink bits. He tripped in the blood and practically ran back to Jack.

"Hey, buddy. I'm sorry...I...um...I accidentally broke the sink. Are you okay?" Sam reached his arms out. Jack covered his mouth.

"You're REALLY bloody! Are you hurt?!" Jack tried to get up.

"Nu-uh! Nonononono, son, you need to lay back down." Sam stumbled to Jack and hugged him to his stomach, hand in his hair as he eased him back into the bed. He was dripping blood on him.

"Sam?... Are you okay?" Jack was crying now.

Cas and Dean stood back in horror watching Sam who had just completely fallen apart for all the things done to him over the years trying to be strong for Jack. Dean's knees were giving out and Cas caught him by his wrist and tucked his hand in his. Dean was shaking and thought about letting go, but Cas clamped down on the hand and gave him a look that said _Let me hold you up. It's my turn._

"Shh...I'm sorry I scared you, buddy...I'm okay. Cas fixed me. I just...I accidentally broke the sink." Sam smiled apologetically and smoothed back Jack's hair.

"Sam? But they told me that you sometimes...That after what my Dad did to you…"Jack was biting his lip.

Sam sputtered and swallowed.

"Oh, no, no I'm okay...I'm gonna be okay. And so are you, bud. And so are you...It's okay. You rest now, alright? Do you need me to get you anything?" Sam was chewing his lip scrambling for anything that could make the boy feel better. He'd not thought of the simplest thing. Jack reached and put his arms around Sam, pushing his face to his neck.

"Please, Sam. Please be okay. I don't think I could...I don't think I could take that…"Jack wouldn't even say it. Sam nodded.

"Go to sleep. It's gonna be fine when you wake up. It was an accident. I'm okay now...I am. I'm sorry! I didn't mean to do it, but I'll be okay and so will you. S'alright…."Sam held Jack until his sickness made him fall asleep.

He pulled away from him, looking sheepishly at his feet.

"I'm sorry...I honestly didn't mean to do all that… I saw...him in the mirror and it scared the crap out me…"Sam was biting his lip.

Cas coughed. He looked at Dean to ask if he was okay to stand on his own now. As if on cue, Dean let go of Cas' hand and smiled. Then Cas turned to Sam and he reached out with shaking arms and hugged him close.

Dean discreetly took Sam and Cas at the same time under an arm in a sort of side hug. He gently prodded them out of Jack's room. Then, he pushed the door mostly closed to let the kid sleep.

"Okay, guys, we need to talk about what just happened. Kitchen. Now." Dean tugged at the hem of Cas' trench coat and the angel stood up, cringing at all the blood Sam had splashed on him. Sam frowned.

"But I'm…"Sam indicated his state.

"If anybody asks us, our cover story is that you were cleaning my weapons. They'll believe you. But no, we need to talk about this exactly like it is so we're leaving you just like you are for a minute until I get my head around it." Dean pulled both his brother and his best friend by their wrists into the kitchen then without another word.


	12. Chapter 12

**Weight of the World**

"The sink...We should probably…" Sam tried to twist back to the bathroom he'd just come from. Dean took his hand, lacing their fingers together as a sort of anchor.

"You're that worried about the sink? No, man, there's a power off switch to the water at that end of the house here in the utility closet. And I can put a new sink in there later. These Letters geeks left spares, you know?" Dean reached his free hand into a trap door in the kitchen wall and pulled a marked lever. He stared at his brother in disbelief. Would he really be more concerned about a broken sink than the fact that he was standing here, knees knocking like a new foal, with blood dripping down his chin, neck, shirt collar, jeans, etc?.

Cas leaned against the table, waiting to be addressed. His lips were knit together until they turned white. He looked like he wanted to scream.

Dean took Sam's other hand in his and led him over to the counter and the kitchen sink. Sam frowned, trying not to meet their gazes.

Dean's eyes were like jade knives and grass blades severing softly all the little strands of defenses that were between them. They searched until they found Sam's eyes. He said nothing. That was somehow more disarming than if he'd made a speech. Sam felt his lips trembling again and a piece of glass fell out of them. He hissed and tried to wriggle away from Dean, but Dean pushed him flush to the counter and smoothed his hair away from his face.

He said nothing still as his hands gently unbuttoned the blood-soaked shirt. He plucked at it like someone asking a flower about loves or loves not plucks petals. Then he peeled it away from dried blood, at last, rolling it off Sam's shoulders and dropping it on the floor in a heap of glass and blood.

Sam drew in a breath. Because he was standing half dressed in front of the strongest people in his lives and he felt so weak and helpless. His heart was rolling in him like a baby bird caught in a monsoon and he bowed his head, ashamed.

Dean put his hands over each of Sam's pectorals. Sam's eyes leaked open, noticing the way Dean swallowed as blood dripped between his fingers, blood having soaked and tarred and feathered the little caged bird that was Sam's heart.

When Dean pulled his palms back, his hands had left ghost white prints on Sam's chest. Sam swallowed but Dean leaned around him, pinning him still with his arm. He turned the sink on, let the water grow warm. He pulled a rag out of a drawer and soaked it. He poured a little bit of dish soap in it and then the rag was full of bubbles, floating like whispers like gossip as water would have its perfect work.

Dean was quiet the entire time he washed his brother's chest and neck and face from the scarlet blood. It was how he was keeping himself grounded and sane and Sam knew it. He wondered for a moment if Dean was angry with him. After all, he'd opened up to him the most he ever had in their lives just a few days ago and now?

"Sam…"It was Cas. He'd stooped and gathered up the bloody shirt. Dean bowed his head to Sam's bare chest, displacing soap suds. Sam stared at Dean in amazement. He thought he'd be angry, but he was shaking. A soft groan escaped him and he pressed his shaking palms to Sam's pectorals again. This time he left prints in the remnant soap.

Cas squeezed the shirt and blood drained to the floor. Sam swallowed.

"Sam, how long did it go on before the breaking started? How long were you in trouble before you got help?" Cas swallowed. Sam looked up at him, amazed by the question. And then, he let a soft chirp as he tried to swallow any comebacks that weren't explicitly honest.

"Honestly?" Sam winced when Dean leaned up and took the nape of his neck in a firm but desperate grip that was like a dog lifting a pup by his scruff.

"Yeah! How about honestly?" He swallowed. This conversation happened too many times. Sam sucked his teeth, eyes watering in disgust when he realized his mouth was also filled with blood.

"About 10 years ago. When I let myself be led down the path that ended with me breaking the world and fixing it by jumping into Hell…." Sam shook himself and patted Dean's shoulder.

"Look, guys, I know you're upset and I'm sorry about that. Really, I didn't mean to scare all of you. But I'm dealing with my crap the best way I can. I have to. See, all of these years, I've had to pay for my curse. At first, I thought I was paying it forward with what I did to Lilith but then I realize I was just buying into it. I cashed in my bad bets with Lucifer. I deserved it. This is getting off easy for all that I should have gotten for what I did." Sam smiled and shrugged.

Dean sobbed. Sam looked at him stunned because he was shaking his head wildly. He'd tried to talk and it came out like a dying frog's anthem. A croaking gutted sob of sound that ended with Dean's head resting just where it had been before, hands pressed desperate and weak again to his brother's chest.

Cas was fuming now. Sam turned to him, stunned. It was rare for Cas to get angry over something like that, but when he did it was rough.

"What is wrong with the Winchesters that they run toward death?! Sam! What do you mean you deserve it? What the hell could you mean by saying something so awful?! Did you deserve to be given a demon's blood at 6- months-old and be tricked and manipulated by demons-more powerful beings than you are in case you've forgotten-into fulfilling a destiny you had no say in-because God wrote it that way?!" Cas hands went up and ripped holes in his bloodied dress shirt. Sam stared at him, mortified.

It felt like Dean and Cas had switched roles because Dean leaned up and took Sam's face in gently cupping hands shaking his head at Cas' outburst.

"Hey, now, Cas. Let's go easy on him. He's not really been in his right head all the way for 10 years either, have you, Sammy?" Dean shook his head, hands caressing Sam's cheeks. He swallowed.

"Listen, where do you get these stupid ideas? Huh? When you were doing all that...Demon blood and all that, you thought you were doing the right thing. It turned wrong because the curse was evil not because you were...Enough of that crap already…"Dean's voice was a lot more gentle than his words sounded. It was like he was talking to the infant incarnation of his brother again as if he could make that All Souls Day in 1983 somehow wash away.

Cas drew a breath understanding. He swallowed.

"Sam, I'm sorry that I yelled at you. It's just...It's so frustrating that I am an eternal being and can't help you see the limited set of options you had…"Cas pushed closer. Sam smiled at him even though he was looking into Dean's eyes. Dean smiled back at both of them even though he was looking straight back at Sam.

"What happened back there in the bathroom? You cut yourself up good." Dean shook his head and swallowed. Sam's eyes were filled with terror now. He wasn't aware that he was hyperventilating until Dean had pressed the wet rag to his face and was telling him to breathe.

"I-I um...Lucifer...I was washing Jack's blood offa me and I was pretty messed up about it. And Lucifer-he came to me...In my head, I guess. But to accuse me like he always did back in the Cage. And he looked like he did back in the Cage. His face...It was...His face was his true face. Without any vessel." Sam swallowed. Dean's mouth fell open as he realized that of course, Sam would know what Lucifer truly looked like. Cas shuddered.

"His true face is hideous, Sam. He hides it even from angels. I've not seen it since his fall, even when he possessed me too." Cas' hand went to his stomach, mortified.

"Be glad. He's uglier than they say. And he...He said that he'd make me pay in the Biblical sense for what I did to Jack letting him die."Sam frowned.

"What? Biblical sense...He meant like? SON OF A BITCH!" Dean's shout was muffled by his hand. Sam shook his head.

"He never got to, Dean. His real vessel is junkless, remember? Kelly Kline was his first time. But I guess my mind wasn't clear on all those details. He was talking some jailhouse stuff and I guess, right then, I was trying to fight him to keep him from doing that to me. I swear I didn't get cut up on purpose. The mirror, the sink, it was me wailing on Lucifer as far as I knew…"Sam cringed. Dean had broken out into a cold sweat.

"That bastard...He never 'got to'? But he threatened you with that more than once, didn't he? Like...When he had his vessel and we were stuck with him. Did he ever try...?" Dean cringed. Sam shook his head.

"Oh, no. You mean like when we were alone on the way back to Apocalypse camp? He talked about it, but I told him that Jack would be more than a little bit afraid of him if he did something that weird to me…"Sam trailed away. Dean looked at Cas, face wine stained in anger. Cas let out a shaky breath.

"Sam...How many times were you going to allow Lucifer to threaten you like that before you told us? I-I pressured you into working with him again." Cas cursed himself, hand going to his mouth now.

Sam's jaw dropped.

"You wanted honesty, so I'm not changing my story. I wasn't going to tell either one of you. Not a damn thing. Because I thought Lucifer and all his campaign to turn me into him was what I deserved for letting him free, accident or not." Sam swallowed.

"Deserved….What the hell, Sam? Deserved...That royal bastard's lucky I didn't pull him apart with my teeth for even blinking at you with them kind of eyes." Dean's hands went to Sam's shoulders, protectively admiring the exposed part of his brother's body by feel. He looked up then and breathed softly.

"You...Let me wash this away. Your back...You got it on your back too, Sammy." Dean pulled Sam closer, turned him around, and turned the sink back on. He lifted another rag, the one he had been using now soaked with blood, and proceeded to wash Sam's shoulders of the blood and broken pieces he'd rolled in. Cas, in turn, sat down at the table and laid his face in Sam's bloody shirt. He babbled then in Enochian, reverting to his native language as a result of his deep upset.

Dean frowned. He went to the fridge and pulled out several beers, pushing one to Cas' hand. He bent over his friend, leaning to look into his eyes and make sure he was alright. Sam watched from the sink, worried about so many things, mostly what he'd done to them now that they needed him to be strong the most. Dean ran his hand through Cas' hair smiling at him where he lay, not attempting to pry the bloody shirt from his clinging fingers. He didn't pull his hand away from Cas' hair until Cas smiled at him and he knew he was fine.

He came back to Sam and turned him around.

"I...I'm…"

"Don't you say you're sorry. Don't…."Dean leaned into Sam, pressing his lips near his ear as he talked to him.

"I don't ever want you to apologize for this again. No matter how weird or bloody the breaks in your head get. It's Lucifer's fault and it always was. As for Lucifer, he's dead. It's a done deal. Let's just get you better now…You and the kid…"Dean's voice trailed away. Sam allowed himself to feel Dean's steady shape encompass him. He'd been terrified before but Dean's warmth was like a safety blanket treating him for the shock inside him.

He realized in a flash flood of tears inside his head that never came free from his eyes. He'd been trusting in the steady frame of Dean's near and protective shape as long as his curse had gripped him. From the nursery fire where his curse began and straight up from the Hellfire where it had been purged, Dean had carried him. Sam may have beat the Devil, but it was Dean who carried the weight of the world. If not for that, they'd not have saved it.


	13. Chapter 13

**Faith of Forsaken Fathers-**

When Dean was done washing Sam's shoulders, he told him to go lay down. Sam discreetly went and put another shirt on. And he did as Dean had told him. Except, he went and lay down in the reclining chair he'd moved to Jack's room.

Deep in the night, Jack woke up to a feeling a soft glow. For a split second, in his sickness haze, he thought _Father._ That signature of light was the same that Lucifer put off, except brighter, undefiled by the darkness in Lucifer's heart. And then Jack realized, through the glare, whose soul it was he was seeing. The vessel of Lucifer his Sire.

Jack lay there watching Sam sleep for a moment, realizing with a sudden threat of childlike tears that this is what it meant. To have a "father". The man who had just bled out from his own collapsed mind was laying here in a chair beside him, a glass of water and a box of fever tablets laced in his fingers in case Jack needed them. Pale as he was having bled out from the trials of his cheerless manhood, Sam was here.

Jack swallowed. The room had grown stuffy, but it was a cozy kind of stuffy in the sense that even here in the roiling heat of fever he was safe. And it dawned on the boy, an off-hand remark of his mind that shouted with profound meaning after a moment. Sam Winchester was the first human being he'd ever laid conscious eyes on.

It was Sam that had stayed with him right after his birth, teaching him to control his powers. Sam who had dove on the Devil and went toe-to-toe with him, even after he'd been tortured by him forever, to protect Jack. And it was Sam who, when the Devil had won, gave Jack the archangel blade and told him to kill him.

Jack realized too that Sam had done all this knowing whose biological son Jack really was. And he'd never held that over him with any kind of keen prejudice, deserved in this sense though it had been.

Jack's hand reached out to Sam's knee. Out of instinct, he snapped awake nearly spilling the water he was clinging to for dear life.

"Hey, champ. You need one of these?" Sam rattled the box, eyes blinking with sleep.

"Sam?"Jack didn't need stupid tablets or water. He needed to talk to this human man that had become his father. He needed to understand the true reasons why he'd taken this role upon himself, after all the pain that Lucifer had caused him.

Who had taught him to be a father? Suddenly, Jack wondered in awe who the Papa Winchester must have been.

"Yeah, bud?" Sam set the water down and the tablets and leaned closer in the dark so he could see Jack's face better in the nightlight they'd been using to navigate his sick room after dark.

"Who was your Dad? Did he teach you to be like you are now?" Jack sat up a little. Sam looked shocked. Jack found now that he was asking questions, he couldn't stop.

"What was his name? Did he look like you or more like Dean? He must have loved you. Did you have a good relationship with him?" Jack tilted his head when he saw Sam getting upset again. He blinked and plastered on a fake smile like he always did in this situation.

"My Dad's name was John. I look more like him than Dean. Dean looks like our Mom and everybody says that. But, my Dad, he was a lot like Dean in his mannerisms and clothes and the way that he walked…"Sam was sad now. He leaned closer and laid his hand atop Jack's sweaty head.

"And he did love me. Very much. I know that he did. But, I didn't have a good relationship with him. That's one of my biggest regrets in life." Sam looked off into space.

"What?! How did you learn to be such a good Dad then if your Dad wasn't nice to you?" Jack's lip trembled. Sam stared at Jack for a moment, shocked. Then, he giggled.

"Oh, well, don't you know? John was my biological Dad maybe but he just wasn't around a lot when I was a kid. And when he was we'd fight all the livelong time. It got old even to us. Dean. He was the one who raised me. He's the reason why I became a man." Sam got a dreamy look in his eyes. And Jack's breath caught in his throat. Of course…

"Dean taught me to be a Dad to you because that's what he became to me when nobody else would. He became my Dad and my Mom and my brother all at the same time. When I was little, and I got sick, he'd give me tomato rice soup, even if he had to steal it out of a grocery dumpster with several dints in the can. Dean walked me to Kindergarten on my first day of school. He taught me how to tie my shoes. He taught me how to ride a bike and sign my name and drive a car and talk to girls and tie a necktie…."Sam bit his lip. He looked at Jack and smiled.

"Dean protected me from bullies like a big brother would. We still had fun just like we were only brothers, but sometimes when I needed blessing out for bad behavior, he'd do that too. He'd save me and help me like I was a baby when I just wasn't grown up enough to do it on my own." Sam shook his head, laughing in mild embarrassment.

" Once when I was about 10 and I got beat the crap out of by some bullies, Dean beat the bullies up and then he literally had to give me a bath. I was mortified then. I cry about it if I think about it too long now. He even brought a rubber ducky to make it funnier and less awkward." Sam and Jack laughed at the same time. Unbeknownst to them, Cas had crept to the door and was peering through the crack. Dean was busy changing out the sink and wasn't hearing any of this.

"When I was a grown-up, I think I was about 23-years-old, my Dad told Dean that he'd have to find a way to save me from the curse I had...Or...Or he'd have to kill me." Sam shook his head. Cas drew a sharp breath and turned away, leaning against the wall with his hand on his mouth. He'd never known that either. Sam and Dean Winchester, masters of the sharing arts, had so many stories about their lives they had yet to confide in the now dying-to-know Castiel.

"But Dean, he wouldn't do that, see. He drove himself nuts trying to save me. And..And eventually, I got killed in a fight with a bunch of other kids the demon that cursed me had made me duke it out with. And Dean….He...He sold his soul at a crossroads so that I could live. He'd lived for me and then he died for me." Sam smiled at Jack whose eyes were wide. Cas felt his heart jump in his chest.

 _So, that's how the Righteous Man ended up in Hell!_

No one had ever made that part of Dean's descent into Perdition totally clear to the angel who'd rescued him. Back then, Dean was just another heavenly assignment.

"When my father gave up on me, my brother didn't. He saved me...So, see, Jack...That's how I learned how to take care of you. I had the best teacher I could have ever asked for…"Sam leaned closer to Jack, pushing his sweaty hair out of his eyes. Jack smiled, pleased with the answer he'd gotten.

But Cas was not. Now, after all of this that had happened, he wanted and needed to know where Dean was in his head. How had the boy that raised Sam been pushed so far as to sell his own soul for the boy? Who was Dean when Cas had not been there to watch over him? How did these brothers form the bond they had despite the breaks in the chains that held them to Earth?

Cas stormed over to the bathroom and leaned against the door. Dean was crawled up under a new sink attachment that had a vanity installed in the bottom of it. He was bolting in pipes.

"Cas, please tell me you're not staring at my butt because that would be freaky." Dean was chuckling around his words.

"Dean, I've got some questions for you and I won't go away until you answer them truthfully." Cas didn't mean to sound snappy. Dean slid out from under the sink to grab another wrench, doe eyes wide with wonder at the tone.

"Ah, okay? What do you want to know?"

"I want to know you, Dean. There's so much you haven't told me I feel like I barely understand your life." Cas tilted his head. Dean chuckled nervously.

"Not thinking of asking Sammy for my hand in marriage are you?" He teased, trying to deflect the subject.

"Dean, I'm serious. I've learned so many troubling things about you and your brother my head is spinning. Who was Jessica? How did she die? Why did your father tell you to kill your brother? Why did you have to raise Sam if your father was still alive?" Cas may be overstepping but the questions were coming out in a gush.

Dean looked like he'd been slapped. He frowned and then he nodded.

"Oh, wow, that's some heavy crap you're asking. Let me make you a deal. You help me finish fixing this freaking fogey contraption sink setup and I'll dispense with the girl talk." Dean nodded to his tools, smiling. Cas nodded.

"Which one?"

"The one with the green band-aid taped to the handle. I color coded them for Jack when I was teaching him which wrenches do what." Dean let out a soft grunt as he crawled under the sink again. Cas watched his friend's shoulders arch with his labor and realized how many heavy burdens had been saddled on that young human back for far too long.


	14. Chapter 14

**The Tale of Bitch and Jerk:**

 _ **Note: This chapter comes with a trigger warning for some more mature thematic elements. It isn't explicit so I haven't changed the story's rating, but some parts of this chapter are a little darker than the others before.**_

 _ **I dedicate this chapter to my teenage relative who died street racing in June. Today was your birthday, kiddo. RIP.**_

Dean led Cas to the library. He had tucked a case of beers under his arm. His eyes were already bloodshot, weary and mentally unprepared for this task.

He pulled a chair up for Cas. Then he sat on the table and set the beers opening two of them and trying to swig both at the same time in the same clenched fist.

"Okay, hit me with it. What are you dying to know?" Dean's eyes rolled in his face. Cas almost regretted making him do this, but he needed to know.

"I...I well, I guess what Sam said about you raising him. I think I understand the rest from what I heard, but...You always made your father sound so pleasant, I don't understand...And...well, Dean, let me be frank. You and Sam….You scare me sometimes with how poorly hidden your brokeness truly is. What if one day neither of you can take it anymore, and can't collapse into one another? Wouldn't it be better to have someone else who knows? I won't breathe a word to anyone." Cas reached for Dean's hand. It had been sitting beside him on the table, trembling like a leaf in an autumn tree. He swallowed. And to Cas' amazement, he let him take his hand.

"I loved my Dad. Worshipped him. But he was always leaving me...Always. There were times I thought we were gonna die. I wasn't old enough to work, so I had me and Sam living in some crap motel until the money ran out and then, we'd be peddling gum or hand-rolled, hand cut cigarettes, or some other cheap crap on the street to get by…"Dean swallowed and swigged the beers again, coughing. He at last dropped the empty bottles near his feet. Beer poured down his neck and his eyes filled up with pain that was searing a Sahara to the tears it replaced.

"It's true, I raised Sam, but only because I was older. What he doesn't say, and he wouldn't, is that he also raised me. You have to understand that all my life, all growing up my Dad treated me like a tin soldier. Barely looked at me unless he was barking at me to do something. I loved him. I don't know if he loved me or not. I swear to God that's something that I'm still completely clueless about all these years later. To him, I was just a little army man. To everybody else, I was "Pretty"." Dean swallowed. Cas cocked his head.

"Yeah, teachers, preachers, Hell little grannies at grocery stores I bummed weekend jobs at. I was Pretty, the kid with the cute face but the box of rocks for brains. And Pretty did as Pretty was told and he kept his mouth shut because he was too dumb to do anything but look at. They thought that cause I didn't really talk when I was young, you know. Not much. Not after _she_ died." Dean sucked his teeth, looking over his shoulder toward his mother's room. And then he laughed a wet laugh and Cas felt something die inside him.

"I'mma sound really fruity right now, but...Sam, see he was like a stand-in Mom to me. I'd come home sapped of all my willpower and Sam would give me these little pep talks. Like he does everybody now. But he'd tell me I was as smart as I was good to look at and I could be anything when I grew up and it made me feel like Superman." Dean nodded.

"And now I'm gonna sound really horrifically like a girl, but when Sam was about 11 he saved my life. Saved me from something worse than death. And I...Well, my Mom always told me angels were watching over me. I just didn't realize that I was falling upside down and my angel was looking out for me by looking up to me." Dean bit his lip.

"He...Did he save you? When he was that young? How?" Cas felt Dean's hand and his whole body attached to it go weak in his grip. He sucked his teeth.

"I-I don't think you want me to tell you about that." Dean gnashed his teeth. But Cas could feel it in his spirit and he put a hand on Dean's shoulder.

"What did they try to do to you? Those men who ran the street races?" Cas tilted his head. Dean's face turned the color of a cotton swab. His mouth fell open. Cas nodded.

"Dean, don't forget. It may not be fair, but I hear the silent prayers you pray. Help me understand. I promise, no one else has to know we ever talked about this. If they overhear it, I'll wipe their minds of it." Cas smiled. And Dean...Dean's teeth chattered a bit, grinding so hard they cracked.

"We were starving. I was...I had dropped two pants sizes. I think Dad was captured by a djinn or something and I...Well, I'd let the phone service lapse so I couldn't call anyone to help me. I was...Man, Sammy's hollow looking eyes...I was desperate. I'd fed him everything we had. And I'd resigned myself that I was gonna die, but I thought that I could keep him alive for a bit, just until Dad finally came back again or Bobby got to missing us. I was 15. I'd gained a reputation for street racing. Thought if I won a prize or a pinks raise I could make fast cash and keep us in the motel and buy Sam one more meal." Dean bowed his head. Cas knew where this was going, and he didn't like it.

"Dean...What did they try to do to you?" Cas took Dean's shirt to keep him from sliding off the table. Dean's eyes opened and he drew a silent, shaky breath.

"I lost. A big prize suite. And the guy cheated so I took a swing at him. But the boss, he said since I was desperate that I could...I could still make money. Because I was sure Pretty...And you know, Pretty would do what he had to do." Dean's face crumpled. And Cas' jaw dropped.

"He gave me this bag with these shoes and this makeup and perfume and crap. It was sick. People were gawking at me. He said come back tomorrow same time and I could work something out…"Dean bowed his head again, closing his eyes. The memory flashed into his head, unbidden. Cas saw it.

 _Dean held the bag to his chest, back to the motel door. He'd put the shoes on, but he couldn't bring himself to put on the shaw just yet...He was bawling now...Like the boney little trick he'd turned into. He was bawling and he was pretty sure he was about to barf on himself._

 _He wrapped the leopard shaw around his chest, bangs falling in his eyes. The perfume was part of it, but he just about couldn't bring himself to do it. Then he thought of Sammy laying over there in his bed, in a hungry daze. And with a little squeak of desperation, he splashed it on his neck._

" _Dean, are you going to some kind of costume party?" Sam sat up on the bed, head tilted to the side._

" _Stay here, Sam! Don't open the door for anybody." Dean wiped his nose, trying to hide his terror at what came next. This was not the way he'd expected this to happen the first time..._

" _Wait, I've got a surprise for you...Are you sure you have to go?" Sam stood in the middle of the room, hair on end, tying another knot into the bandana belt he was using to synch up his pants._

" _Sam, damn it, yes! Go back to bed!"_

 _Dean trudged out the door and jumped into the pickup he stole from the junkyard. He sat behind the wheel, bawling into the shaw knowing what he was doing was sick and that he should hate himself for it. What he didn't know was that Sam and his cash prize for a rare set of baseball cards he'd sold had climbed up into the truck's bed._

 _Dean got to the race strip and pulled around to the back parking lot where several guys stood waiting for him. Catcalls and whoops of joy were waiting for him._

" _You ever do anything like this before, Trixie?" The boss stood there smoking, a smug smile on his face._

" _If you don't pay me after, I'll cut you." Dean was trying to keep up his machismo._

" _Hmm, well here's how it's gonna work. We're gonna have a silent auction for you. Everybody puts his name and his money in the hat. The one with the most money gets to take you back to his car. Blindfold him…"The boss nodded to one of his goons. Dean felt a tiny shriek escape him. The little scream and the laughter were enough to keep him from seeing Sam sneak out of the truck bed and put the 1,500 dollars from the prize he'd won and his name into the hat._

" _Okay, we've got 5 by Joe and 6 from Allen and 7 bucks from Davy….Woo, Pretty, you're worth 7 bucks!" Keening laughter and Dean was sure he was about to vomit. He was pretty sure he might wet his pants too. What the hell was he thinking?!_

" _Oh, wait...You! You're the one who put in 1,500 eh? Well, 1,500 bucks in exchange for this chicken bone...What do you guys think the money or the little punk?" There was a commotion of sound that Dean in his sudden blindfolded terror didn't hear._

" _Okay, fine then. Be glad we don't like them like you. Also, be glad you brought that much lettuce. Now get out of here with your little ho, you Bitch!" The boss spat and Dean could feel it on his face._

" _What about my money?!" Dean screamed. All of this for nothing?!_

 _A rough hand was on his shoulder. It hauled him in the direction of a vehicle. He didn't realize until later it was the pickup truck he'd driven here. He was slammed on his back in the driver's seat and squealed like a girl as someone climbed up with him and closed the door._

 _The blindfold was tugged off roughly but he kept his eyes closed tight, not wanting to see who was going to do this to him. He suddenly felt tiny woman-sized hands take his face. Oh, help, a freaking cougar?! Really?! Dean was bawling like a baby when he felt someone's lips press gently to his closed eyelids and a voice practically cooed to him in what sounded suspiciously like relief._

" _You are such a-a freaking JERK! What the hell are you doing with these creeps?! And what's with the getup and why the heck are they trying to buy you? Is this like that movie...uh...Pretty Woman?!" The voice. It was his Sammy's voice!_

" _What the?!" Dean's eyes flew open. And Sam was in the cab with him…_

" _Wait...you're "Bitch"?"_

" _What are you calling me a bitch for, jerk?!" Sam was crying now, but he was also laughing. He ripped the leopard shaw and the shoes off of Dean throwing them in the floor with a ferocious growl that sounded more like a puppy's yipping squeal in the 11-year-old's voice._

" _BITCH!" Dean took Sam's face in his shaking hands._

" _You smell like cotton candy...And Dean….The surprise was supposed to last a while. What were you doing?! Now we only have enough left for one set of cheeseburgers or something…"Sam held up 20 dollars. Dean leaned forward, planting several wild kisses on Sam's face. Sam sat long-suffering, face scrunched up at the fact that Dean's face was snotty and wet._

" _You beautiful little bitch you saved me…."Dean was bawling harder now his whole body shaking. Sam sighed._

" _Dean...You know, I'm not a little kid. I know about this kind of stuff...And that's just freaking sick what you were gonna let them do to you! You're supposed to save that for somebody who loves you...Somebody you could get married to…"Sam shook his head. Dean was bawling into and chewing at his sleeve now. Then, he leaned over the seat and threw up in the floorboards._

" _Oh, you, you freaking JERK! Look at you…"Sam reached over and held Dean's hair up off his face. He rubbed his back as Dean bawled around the vomit that was streaming down his legs._

" _Shh,...Dean we gotta go before those creeps come back. Here, scoot over…"Sam manhandled Dean until they switched places. He took the costume and sopped up the puke with it, growling again in frustration as he pulled cigarette boxes out of the glove box and rubber band strapped them to his feet so that he could reach the pedals. He then boosted himself to see over the steering wheel by sitting on the money box he'd had under his arm this whole time._

" _See, I sold those old baseball cards Uncle Bobby gave me for my birthday. They were worth way more money than I'dda thought, Dean! But you know something, they weren't worth as much as you...Nothing is...Please, please, please pretty please with like a bushel of cherries on top don't ever do anything like this again, you...you freaking JERK!"_

Dean looked up at Cas with innocent eyes. Cas felt his stomach flop up to his chest, finally understanding where the strange endearments had come from.

"We-um...We never talked about it again. And I...I hated myself for years. But that sweet little kid saved me. He raised me up above what I thought I was worth and he made me swear on a Bible a few hours later never ever to try and do that again no matter how hungry we got. We bought cheeseburgers and groceries and even some stomach medicine for me with that 20 dollars and Dad came back about 5 days later…"Dean smiled. He blinked then and took Cas by the coat.

"Sam...He's the reason why there's any kind of value left to me. He preserved me. He's my salvation. And...And see, that's who I am. That's the story of my life and my first love. My little brother has been the center of my world for more reasons than anybody could possibly understand. So, if you want to understand who I am and who I was before you came along, you only need to look to him." Dean shook himself, realizing in his heart that he was being a lot more open now that Michael had left him so vulnerable.

Cas was speechless. Just then, Sam stumbled into the room, scratching his head, oblivious to the emotional conversation.

"Hey, buddy, how you feelin'?" Dean's face visibly brightened when Sam came into the room after that dreary conversation. Cas felt his stomach put back in the right place again.

"Turns out even after getting healed, bleeding a lot makes you friggin hungry. The kid's asleep so I'mma grab a snack. Does anybody want anything? Or, let me rephrase that, does anybody want something that's non-alcoholic?" Sam gave Dean a smug look. Dean smiled.

"I'll take a bacon sandwich, Bitch." Dean winked. Sam rolled his eyes.

"Okay, one cold and two-day-old bacon sandwich coming up, Jerk." Sam pointed at Castiel who was now breathless to hear these nicknames used knowing their origin.

"No, no I'm good…" Cas smiled at Sam who held his thumbs up and shuffled off to the kitchen.

Cas looked at Dean who was watching Sam walk away face completely radiating the strong affection he'd dredged up. And Cas realized like a thunderclap, he really was okay!


	15. Chapter 15

**Shortcut to Bable**

He'd thought he'd found the way to make Jack better. If he needed grace to be immortal, and Lucifer's grace made him what he is, then all Sam would need to do is harvest Lucifer's grace. The trickiest part was that Lucifer was dead, or so he thought. But then he remembered that he had been the house for Lucifer once. And in that knowledge, Lucifer was still sewn into the fabric of his whole being. The hallucination in that bathroom had opened an Escape Room from his greatest tragedy. Sam needed a spell.

"What are you doing?" The early morning light peered through the library. Books had strewn the desks, each playing an alphabet game of souls as they danced in the wind from a stray window. Dean stood there in his bathrobe wreathed in an aura of hot water, Irish Spring and concern. Sam smiled at him, and Dean saw the blood in the smile and froze.

"I'm saving Jack. But it isn't the safest plan. But it's an escape room a failsafe that must have been left in me when I_He always said that it would end when I couldn't take it anymore-aha!" Sam snapped his fingers. Dean looked over his shoulder to see where Castiel might be. Then he stretched a hand out.

"Sammy….Whatever is happening inside your head, let me help." Dean gulped. Sam looked up at him and was babbling suddenly in a language Dean didn't understand. Dean felt the breath leave his body. Sam held up a penknife, smiling like he was explaining his favorite breakfast choice.

"Sam?" Dean took his brother by his wrists to find his arms were lacerated deliberately. Sam went on talking, but the words made no sense. Then, he blinked, realizing that Dean's panic was intensifying. He couldn't understand him!

"S-sorry...I do that every now and then when I'm really lost in thought." Sam turned away, leaving blood on Dean's hands.

"Sorry? What the heck were you even gibbering at me? Why have you hacked your arms up like that?! Sam! Hurting yourself isn't going to make Jack better. What?" Dean stepped closer. Sam put several little jars of Rowena style spices in a bowl and dripped his blood on it.

"Don't you see? It will! Jack needs his biological Dad's grace and I have some of it. Granted it's still engraved on my DNA in the form of burn torture, but if I can extract it from my blood-then I can heal him with it! All I need is…"Sam started to babble in the language again. Dean felt his face and body crumbling like trampled crackers at the thought of this.

"Sam, what the hell? Look, let's find a better way to do this!" Dean reached out shaking hands. Just then, Cas came in from outside carrying a small bag of fever reducer and vegetables he'd bought in town thinking they'd make Jack better. He dropped his grocery bag and looked up when he heard Sam talking.

Sam looked up and waved at him, still speaking the weird language. Cas stuttered and answered, to Dean's amazement, in the same.

"What-How do you understand this crap?!" Dean put his hands in his hair.

"Because he's speaking my native language?" Cas shook his head.

"Enochian?!" Dean turned to Sam whose back was turned. He wasn't jabbering anymore but he seemed completely oblivious to the fact that he had been as he siphoned through six more blood extraction ritual books.

 _How do you know this language?_ Cas called out to Sam. Dean looked at Cas with growing fears.

 _What? What do you mean?_ Sam said in the same.

 _Well, you're speaking Old High Enochian-it's like Queen's English to angels. Where on earth did you get so fluent in it-it's almost a dead language in heaven?!_ Cas smiled, actually excited to be conversing in his own language again, never mind that it was a slightly different and harder dialect of it.

Sam blinked and looked at his bloody arms.

 _I was? Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't hear it! I'm trying to strip the part of my blood that is still connected to Lucifer from me. He spoke it to me in the Cage. Drilled it into me when he'd play word games with my head. Pain has one good thing going for it. It's a great teacher._ Sam smiled.

"Okay, can you two English for five seconds!" Dean had tripped over the table he'd suddenly leaned on and was scrambling to tie his robe that he'd torn open falling. Cas looked over his shoulder quickly and stepped in front of him to hide him from the eyes of any of the strangers in the house. Dean was shaking and had a hard time tying the robe back. So, Sam reached over and did it for him, oblivious to the blood running to his fingers and sliding down the robe's sash.

"S-sorry, sorry Dean…"Sam opened his mouth to explain, but Enochian came out again. He pressed his palm to his lips and then, his face turned the color of beet juice with embarrassment.

"Sorry for what? Why can't you speak English? Sam, whatever you're doing with the Voodoo, please stop…"Dean shook his head, having turned green around the mouth. Cas lifted Dean by the shoulders.

"It's alright. I'll help him. I've seen this happen once before." Cas smiled. Dean's hands floundered at Cas' wrists.

"Why...Why is he speaking Enochian? Is it the spell or can he really? I didn't know that he even knew how if he does? Why does he?!" Dean looked at Sam who had turned away, swishing the spell in the bowl.

"He, well, he learned in the Cage. Lucifer would only speak to him in Enochian after he forced him to learn it, evidently. It's okay. We angels sometimes lose our English skills when we tap into the grace directly. I know how to help his mind snapback." Cas smiled. Dean was shaking now. He looked at Sam.

"Well, you can pretty much still understand English. Brat! Always getting in trouble. I'm warning you, if you hurt yourself over there I will personally deliver a kick straight up your Down Under!" Dean shook his finger at Sam who turned to him, eyebrows raised in amusement. He wisely remained silent. Dean gasped in annoyance and stormed from the room to go and dress himself.

Sam looked up apologetically.

 _I upset him pretty easily, don't I?_ Sam sighed watching his brother storm off.

 _There's no reason to apologize. It's just that the spell you are doing isn't safe, exactly. What Lucifer left carved in you was created out of pain from your soul. There's no pure way to extract it. Even if we try, it will kill you. Neither of those things will help Jack._ Cas took Sam's shoulder. Sam's hands were shaking now. Cas smiled and drew a deep breath.

 _I'd rarely say this openly because to humans it seems strange to say. But we're using my language now so there's no one to know otherwise but you. I love you, Sam. I love you and Dean as more than I have words-even natively-to explain. Please don't do something that would hurt yourself. It will only make the problem we already have worse in the end and then you'll have hurt for nothing._ Cas felt wonder overtake him seeing the understanding in Sam's eyes. Hearing this language again after God had left made Cas almost want to cry from happiness. The fact that Sam had learned it through pain made Cas want to cry for a completely different reason. But laughter took the shortcut through him, keeping him on his feet as the innocence in Sam's young eyes evened his spirit out and made the joy center front to the angel's broken heart.

 _Cas, I think I may have hurt myself though. My arms are cut as deep as I could do safely to get as much blood as possible, but that's not so bad. It's just...My head feels fuzzy and I can't really remember how to say my own name as it was given to me. That's scary kinda...I mean, what if I can't talk to Dean again?!_ Sam's eyes went wide. Cas laughed.

 _If that happened, we'd just teach him our language. To talk to you, he'd learn, believe it. But don't worry. This is sort of like being waterlogged except with magic. Let me heal you and then let's not do this spell._ Cas put his hand to Sam's forehead. Sam nodded and his eyes went wide as he felt Cas' healing go through him.

"Well? How do you feel?" Cas tilted his head.

"Like you've got some explaining to do?" Dean stormed back into the room, still pulling a T-shirt over his head. Sam smiled at him.

"Like Cas stopped me from walking off a cliff maybe?" Sam smiled at Cas and then drew a long- suffering breath. Dean grabbed him by the back collar of his shirt and drug him to the garage, yelling at him the entire way.

Cas cleaned up the remnants of the spell, shivering as Sam's blood spoke to him with the cries of his tortured spirit. And when he punched a hole straight through the table and the floor, he passed it off later as an accident with a stack of books.


	16. Chapter 16

**Swans and Their Songs In Hell**

 _ **(Old High Enochian in this chapter is based on Darija/Baghdadi)**_

By the time Castiel got to the garage, Dean was rubbing a wet and soapy car wash sponge in Sam's hair.

"Your poor little brain was hit with the idiot stick. Let me get that for you." Dean had his arm wrapped around Sam's chest, scrubbing at his ears. Sam's mouth had filled up with soap that he was now shooting out his nose laughing so hard.

"Get off of me, you freak!" Sam's hands twisted around Dean's forearm but the big brother wasn't about to let go.

"Not until you explain what the Hell you thought you were doing?" Dean squeezed the soap into Sam's ears. Sam tossed his head trying to get free. By now, Cas realized he was bowed over his knees laughing. And strangers in the garage had noticed.

Sam finally wrenched free and slammed Dean by his hands down on the hood of the Impala. He spat soap on the tarmac. He leaned close to Dean's face, drew a shaky breath that sent bubbles floating from each end of his lips and made him look rabid. And then he smiled because Dean was laughing too hard for this to continue long without Sam choking on the bubbles.

 _Kah-ya! An-ahabawk bayzafi!_ Sam blurted it out, ruffling Dean's hair. Dean's eyes went wide.

"I thought you fixed him!" Dean looked scared.

"He did, I'm just messing with you." Sam winked.

"Well, what the Hell did you say?" Dean's fingers twisted in Sam's now soaked shirt. Sam slung more bubbles out of his hair, shaking like a dog at bath time. Cas dodged the spray, rolling with laughter now. Because Sam had said something that Dean would consider the ultimate chick-flick moment thing to say.

"What are you laughing at? What the Hell did he say?" Dean jabbed a pointer finger into Sam's chest, looking to Cas now with a half-scowl and half-smile teasing his lips.

"I said…"Sam smiled and pulled Dean to standing taking his face in his hands and smiling at him straining to make himself look particularly dramatic. Dean blinked annoyed but laughing.

To Dean's surprise, Sam's humor drained out of his face along with the affected drama. Then, he was totally serious, despite the water running down his forehead.

" _Kahya...An ahabawk bayzafi…"_ Sam said that much slower...And then he laughed and leaned closer to Dean.

" _Kahya, bebawk mah-beyawd...n'na hayafi…."_ Sam dropped his head now, blinking at himself in what might be intense pain. Castiel put a hand over his mouth, having heard the swan song rise from Hell in those words, something Dean lacked the grasp to appreciate yet. And then Sam laughed and slapped Dean on the shoulders, going to clean up the mess he'd made with the car wash effects.

"Right, well if that spell didn't work, something that's less brain scrambling might. I'm going back to the books and then...Uh, I think Mom said we have a case? Guess if we got out of here, we might be able to regroup and think of new and better ways to help Jack..." Sam looked over his shoulder as several of the strangers waved to him, already asking "Chief" for answers about their own missions in Michael hunting. Sam was drawn away from the strange sudsy scene.

Dean's face twisted in a look of consternation. Because Cas was shaking his head, beaming like he'd seen some kind of cheesy rom-com when Sam walked off.

"What the Hell did he say?" Dean looked up at Cas. Cas laughed.

"Well, it's kind of hard to explain in English, because you don't really have an endearment as strong for it. _Kahya_ means "brother". He pretty much just said that he loves you...Like you are his life." Cas sniffed back chuckles at Dean's violated machismo when his face wrinkled in amazement and then, then he was wide-eyed with pursed lips like he was flattered and disturbed all at once.

"Well, let's make sure the Chief doesn't kamikaze himself trying to magic Jack back to health." Dean stood up slowly, letting soap slide off of him.

"He's looking for a spell to heal, Jack? Let's find it first…" Dean stormed toward the library while Riley had Sam looking at a hand-drawn map.

Cas smiled. He had a feeling that this was the beginning of something strangely deep. How would Sam have learned how to express brotherly love via Enochian speak from the Devil in Hell? That seemed unlikely. But he couldn't have gotten the vocabulary for that from anyone else directly. Lucifer was the last native speaker of the language Chuck and Amara had shared between each other.

Unless, of course, this meant that Lucifer's torture had reached to the deepest parts of him and replaced his native speech in his deepest thoughts with the speech natural to Lucifer's grace signature unmaking him. Words that the tormenting Devil wouldn't teach Sam, things he wouldn't know by learning, had come gushing up in burning and blood and an Eternity sacrificed. A swan song straight from Hell fragrant with the incense of an eternally dying sacrifice.

Cas understood so much more now and swore to protect this _bebawk ma beyawd_ this "white love" or "pure bond" with the rest of his own life.

 _ **A.N. Old High Enochian glossary:**_

" _ **Kahya...An ahabawk bayzafi"**_ _-Literally, "Brother, I love you too much."_

" _ **Kahya, bebawk mah-beyawd...n'na hayafi"-**_ _Literally, "Brother, white love, my life…"_


	17. Chapter 17

**Karoshi:**

 **AN:** _Ka-rou-shi is a Japanese word that means "overwork death"_

Many times in their lives Dean had watched Sam spiral out of control. It was as if Dean were juggling Sam's fine china bones, wondering which one would slip through his fingers and break. A leg or an arm could maybe be afforded, but to break his backbone, his undying will? Dean was terrified that one day that would happen, but then he was also terrified it was impossible.

For if Sam's will could not be broken, there would be no corresponding melting down. And if he could not meltdown, his torture truly was forever. Sometimes, dare he say, Dean wished his brother would break so that he could pick his pieces up for him. So that he could keep him from hurting himself anymore.

Dean was almost instantly aware that Sam was hiding signs of intense exhaustion. He'd tried to coax him off to bed several times over the last few days, sometimes falling asleep in a chair or on the couch waiting for him. He'd also gently tried to make him eat something.

"You're not going to be able to keep going like this." Dean leaned next to Sam's ear late at night. He'd brought him a small bowl of soup. Honestly, he was afraid to feed him something more wholesome-he hadn't seen him eat in a week and was afraid hearty food would make him sick. Sam looked sidelong at him and smiled.

"Oh, thanks. Here, I'll set it here." Sam patted Dean's hand as if to reassure him.

"Did you go on those two hours of sleep you were talking about?" Dean frowned. Sam's eyes were crossing over his research and half a dozen other reports he'd typed up from his little army's activities. He rubbed a hand over his face and looked at Dean like he just realized he was here.

"Hey, buddy...Thanks for the soup." Sam placed his palm over Dean's heart for a second, letting his eyes flash over him, visibly relieved that he was with him again. Dean sighed, knowing then that the Venus flytrap of Sam's mind had been too focused on whatever he was doing in this library office to have heard what he said. He reached around Sam and hugged him from behind, letting his hands rest on his collarbone. Sam went on flipping through the pictures one of his hands rubbing Dean's shaking wrist.

Dean stayed there for a long while. More than 10 minutes. He held his breath for a while and then laid his face in Sam's hair. Sam barely noticed the duration of time Dean held him, so absorbed he was in his work.

"I know you 're not hearing a word I'm saying...As tired as you are, as much as you're working, but...I really wish you'd eat. You're starting to scare me." Dean muttered it into Sam's ear feeling his brother press his hand closer as his free hand fretted with Dean's fingers subconsciously seeking rest in Dean's touch.

"At this rate, we're never gonna find Michael. Got to pick up the pace! Oh, and then...Let's see there's a book with spells in it from the lost collections in the old vault next to our dungeon. Remind me to check that later see if we can heal Jack with it…"Sam was chattering, thumb having curled between Dean's fingers and rubbing against his palm.

"Mm, okay, but maybe you should take like a 15-minute break first and eat your soup…"Dean swallowed. In the past, he'd have been aggressive. Snapped at Sam and made a scene until he'd done as he'd asked him to. But after Michael, Dean was so broken inside himself that he'd retreated into his own skin a bit. He felt like he was trapped under a hundred concrete blocks and couldn't bust out to shake Sam and make him care for himself better.

Dean closed his eyes and remembered the last time Sam's exhaustion got the better of him. It had happened 7 years ago when Lucifer's lingering presence would not let him go. Oh, how he'd tried to help him then, to almost no avail.

" _Sammy, really, red eye is not a healthy meal replacer…" Dean watched Sam come back with the 12th coffee he'd bought today. Sam held up a stack of bills._

" _Mm, I'm part of a reward program. Buy six get the seventh free? Hey, you know we should probably stow the car we've been driving. I think I saw a camera on the way into this park." Sam looked over his shoulder. At 29, his eyes said he was 50. Dean felt a little cry go up into his throat. He reached over to Sam, grabbing his shirt._

" _What?" Sam swallowed._

" _Is he bothering you now?" Dean cleared his throat, glaring down a guy at the coffee kiosk who was looking at them like they were a couple._

" _The Devil...yeah, he always is. Why?" Sam smiled. Dean let out a gasp._

" _The black around your eyes has got you looking like a raccoon. Why don't you try to take a little power nap? You know coffee doesn't work anymore after a few rounds." Dean shook his head. Sam frowned._

" _How'm I supposed to take a power nap, Dean? With the Devil singing Def Leppard in my brain? Maybe I could just try to brainstorm Leviathan slaying battle plans instead." Sam laughed, cringing._

 _Dean nodded and then, he sat on the state park table. He reached his arms out. Sam's brows twisted, confused._

" _Look, chicka, I'm not gonna make a big girly scene. I think maybe if I help you-you can afford 15 minutes. That's like half a wink, right?" Dean swallowed. Sam looked at the coffee he'd sucked dry._

" _What? Hug therapy is the new Ambien?" Sam laughed._

" _Not sure. But when you were little, you took naps on my knee all the time. Come on, you can't tell me you don't remember the Bus Stop Sleep Exchange? Whichever one of us was more groggy in the morning used the other as a napping accountability partner until the school bus showed up. Ring a bell? Maybe it's been 20 years, but it's worth a shot, right?" Dean frowned._

 _Sam's eyes were so hungry for rest, he didn't ask any more questions. He just bowed over the table and laid his head in Dean's lap. Dean let a soft breath through his nostrils and put his hand in Sam's hair._

" _Goodnight, princess…Also, forgive me, but that's not a pea under your pillow, it's a quarter in my pocket." Dean hissed a soft little teasing sound. Sam's fingers curled in Dean's belt like he was trying to ward off the devil by clinging to the part of Dean's clothes that were nearest his gun._

 _He'd closed his eyes, but no sleep came. Dean could feel him pretending to sleep, and trying to with the greatest force of will as if he could control it. Dean felt a shudder go through him knowing Sam had even acted like he'd been asleep by sitting up with an affected yawn. They both knew that maybe the tension headache at least had been somewhat eased by Dean's anxious fingers._

Dean snapped out of it realizing he'd been holding Sam for a solid 20 minutes when he looked down at Sam's laptop screen. Sam was oblivious to it and the soup had grown cold.

"Ahem, can I help with anything?" If Sam wouldn't sleep, Dean wouldn't either. If little brother was going to die from overwork, then so would Dean. He couldn't bear to watch him unravel on his own again, unravel though he was determined to do. Dean let his hand slide up to resting over his brother's lips in a sort of gentle gag pose. It was enough to jar Sam's attention and Dean let his hands slide away from him as he sat down next to him in the pile of papers.

"Um, oh, hi? How long have you been here? Sorry, I thought I heard you talking to me but…"Sam swallowed and Dean laughed nervously. Was Sam so tired that he didn't even notice Dean had just been clinging to him for dear life?

"Wait? Oh, you've been here for a while! I'm sorry...I was I wasn't completely ignoring you on purpose...And you brought me food and I didn't eat it…"The placating apologies started when Sam saw the soup.

"That's okay...Look here. Are you hungry? I can go heat that up again." Dean nodded. Sam gasped.

"Um, oh wow! I haven't eaten since Wednesday!" Sam frowned. Dean let out a gasp of relief when their eyes met at last.

"Want me to heat it up? Think we have some crackers too…"Dean swallowed, hopeful.

"Please? I'm...I'm sorry, Dean. You look exhausted." Sam frowned. Dean gasped, trying not to snap at him. HE looked exhausted? What about Sam?!

This time when Dean brought the soup back, Sam reached for it eagerly. But he nearly spilled it on himself, with hunger ridden hands now shaking like old cameras. Dean gently batted Sam's hands away and pulled out a napkin.

"Let me…" Dean looked around. No one was here to notice. Sam's eyes went wide.

"Look, you're about to keel over. Let me." Dean nodded. Sam smiled and then he slid forward nearly falling out of the seat. Dean pushed a chair close and wrapped the napkin around Sam. He spooned half the bowl of soup into his brother's mouth before he fell asleep in it.

"Oh my God!" Dean shook his head, lifting Sam out of the soup and wiping his face clean. He then proceeded to lay him down in his lap and set the soup bowl aside. With Sam there on his knees and his hands-free, he reached over to the table and started sorting papers and command reports and all the like of crazy Sam had sacrificed health for.

"Our lives, man. Our freaking lives are literally like some kind of Satanic washing machine, putting patterns on a spin cycle." Dean finished cleaning up and started combing through some of Sam's research himself hoping to help him.

Dean fell asleep an hour later but then jarred awake. Sam had let out a little groan as his alarm clock said it was time to get back to work.

"M-maybe you should not...not go back right now?" Dean took Sam by his shirt as he sat up in his arms.

"Huh? I..I need to…" Sam's eyes crossed. Dean opened his mouth to say something when the little army came storming in, apparently with all their alarms going off at the same time.

"I'll be okay, really. Thank you." Sam smiled bravely at Dean, face reflecting the same soldiering smiles that had graced his dying face in the psychiatric ward he'd landed in after his Wall came down. Dean let out a little gasp and stood up with Sam, hands shaking as his brother walked into the center of the group to answer their instant questions.

 _I can't...I can't watch this again. God, please….Hasn't he had enough already?!_


	18. Chapter 18

**Mother Mary, Quite Contrary**

 **Trigger warning: Some descriptions of accidental injury may be disturbing for younger readers.**

It was days before Dean and Mary had time to catch up. Mary was always gone with someone else.

And Dean could have been okay with that, except it seemed like she didn't care that Sam was on the verge of off-railing again. He'd finally been sleeping a little, but only because one night Dean had tied a rope to his heels when he was studying and hauled him by his ankles into his bedroom. He tied him to his bed and made him sleep for 6 solid hours. And when he woke up, he force-fed him an entire cheeseburger.

He and Sam laughed about it later, but Dean couldn't help but wince when he thought of Mary alone with Sam for those weeks he'd been gone. Thinking of how Mary had sent Dean to do a mother's job that night, like all the nights of their lives before when she was dead and not just sitting in the kitchen with Bobby 2.0. So, Dean did the Mom-Dad-Big Bro thing again and stormed into Sam's room and pinned him with his knee on his chest until he, at last, agreed to eat the burger without any more fuss. The smile on Sam's face then won his heart back from rage at his situation. Like it had done for a thousand boyhood nights when those same puppy dog eyes said grace in answer to prayers Dean never knew his own eyes prayed.

It seemed innocent when Dean and Mary finally decided to hang out a little, after everything. They were going to go into town for a supply run. Get some coffee together. And talk. What Mary called "girl talk" and Dean didn't argue with. Talk as cheap as it was could be a start. Anything even rhinestone moments to buy her heart were worth it to Dean.

He felt a twinge when Sam didn't come with them. Said he needed to run an errand on his own. Said he was investigating a lead Maggie found, that it was part of her training and wouldn't take long.

"Hey, I'll catch up later. "Sam had hugged Dean almost subconsciously. Dean melted into it, not caring that there were eyes on them. Sam's whole body screamed _Help me I'm tired and scared and just need someone right now._ Dean didn't want to press him. He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath of Sam's cologne. Some random shower caddy brand knock-off of Polo that Jessica had loved and hailed back to the time of a doe-eyed Joe college. He breathed it in like it was sacred fire, praying that it carried a bit of his spirit with it and could usher his hurting soul down into the pool of Dean's shared half of it.

Then Dean watched Sam kiss their mother on her golden head, praying with the thimble full of faith that remained in him that she would see it. That she would see the longing way his hands trembled as they lingered in said golden locks, longing to hide behind them like the cuddled toddler he never was. That she would call him out on the nervous warble in his voice and the haunted look in his eyes and that he would listen. That she could hear the thoughts behind the self-deprecating laughter that said _There's still a motherless child inside me that never got the crusts cut off his bread_ even as a man's voice said "Cas and Jack can't live without their PBJ now, Mom. Glad you're making a run."

But she didn't and Dean cried a little on the inside. He went into town with her all the same, loving and hating her every day.

On the way back, they weren't really talking anymore. Dean had a lot on his mind. And there was only so much "monster of the week" fat to chew on. Mary didn't ask much about the sudden silence. Dean kept on with it hoping maybe she would ask him and that it would be obvious that she cared. That she remembered their last real heart to heart when he'd explained the history of his and Sam's lives.

Maybe in the stillness of this moment, she'd remember the boy she'd cut the PBJ crusts off for, and maybe she'd remembered the one she never did. That her heart would be moved for the kid who loved her store-bought apple pie and for the baby brother whose stinging ears had forgotten the sound of _Hey Jude_ on her lips.

Dear God! Why couldn't she ask questions? The same kinds of questions that he'd always wanted to ask her, and maybe he would know what it felt like to be held in a parent's heart for a fragile moment like blowing bubbles and birthday candles. Maybe-

He was spiraling in a figure eight off the road driving like there was black ice where only blacktop was. Suddenly, her questions would never matter, and all of the love lost between him and her and little broken brother were gone. His heart was a thousand years of birthday candles suddenly snuffed and an ocean of bursting bubbles. Because the engine parts to a motorbike were burning in the ditch.

"Dean, what is it?" Mary had snapped out of her contrary silence. And Dean, Dean heard this ill-timed but long desired question and it roiled through him like boiling acid.

 _What is it? Oh, nothing really important. Just, you know, if you'd been paying attention you'd realize all the blazing pieces of what used to be SAM'S BIKE!_

Dean ignored her even though now she was following at his heels.

"Sammy! Sammy, please…"Dean was shouting it now before he had a clear bead to follow. Mary froze. Dean felt the resignation and guilt in her outward frost. And oh he longed for her apparent caring about the times before their lives with her. He longed for a Mother out of Mary then more than he ever had in all his days.

Dean scanned the burning ditch heart racing. He was unaware that his phone was in his hands trembling until he heard Cas' voice speaking to him like tears out of heaven. Into his mind snapped an instant unwanted memory.

 _Don't touch me! I don't want whatever you're selling._ His own voice, in his hell, the blood in his burning hands as he cleaned up after torture, as he was chained again into the iron maiden he was put in only to stew in after a day's worth of wailing on others after years of being roasted alive.

 _Don't struggle so much! I've come to save you, whether you want to be or not._ A bright light, a gentle voice, heavenly tears falling on his Hell scorched face, a hand searing through the blistered flesh of his arm.

Castiel. The angel of his mother's long-ago faith who seemed to find him every time she had abandoned him in Hell.

The present snapped back.

"Dean! Dean, what is it!" Cas practically shouting into the phone.

"Please...Please come. To mile marker 12...It's Sam...his bike… I think. Damn it, Cas!" Dean heard the terror in his voice, the self-hate, and spite and all the same that he'd heard when he'd argued with the savior there in Alistair's dark corner of the deep.

"I'm coming. Stay on the phone." Cas' voice as cool as the tears from heaven had been.

And Mary, contrary Mary, with her hand on Dean's shoulder. She was talking to him but he heard nothing that she said. He handed the phone to her. He heard Cas protesting, but something in him had died a little more. The one who always meant to save him was not welcome in this scene of ice and fire where salvation would not come.

"Dean! Please!" Cas' voice in raw distress.

"It's me. Mary. He gave me the phone." Mary's voice, shaking but resigned.

"I'm coming, Mary. He's...If he's giving you the phone he's not going to be himself. Stay back from him, he might accidentally hurt you. He's viciously protective when it involves Sam." Cas hung up. Mary's eyes went wide with the realization that this was the first time she'd been present for the truly bloody tragedies between her boys. And she watched, without trying to intervene. Watched Dean, like melting iron, like the man lost in the flames of Hell, following the motorcycle debris and flames. Until he reached a tree.

Mary stopped and covered her mouth. Sam was pinned to the tree by the bike's handles. The tree itself was on fire as if struck by lightning, but the ground was cold. In fact, there was frost around it.

Dean said nothing to Sam. Not at first. He reached into the flames in an attempt to lurch him free. Only then did he cry out in agony at the ice and the fire wreathing Sam to the tree. Sam's eyes fluttered open. The handlebars were twisted in his ribs in a metal maze like a cage around him. He was speared to the tree by them. Blood came up his mouth and rolled down his neck. He coughed and smiled, with red teeth and bloodshot eyes.

"Dean!" He winced. But to Mary's shock and awe, and at last, bringing the contrary sainted mother to her knees, Sam showed no signs of apparent pain.

"Sam! What the hell?!" Dean growled. Sam nodded.

"No, exactly. Hell. The lead Maggie had...I'm sorry, Dean. It's one of Michael's hybrids. A special kind of djinn. I didn't know that until about an hour ago-God, my head-My phone crapped out and I…"Sam's hands reached out in pain. Dean took both of them, kissed both of them, oblivious that they were both smoking and burning and so was Sam's whole body.

"Shh, don't talk I'll hear it after, huh?" Dean smiled. Sam gnashed his teeth.

"Dee, it was a Soul-Eater. A djinn-like it sucked the contents of my soul out on the surface and...And well obviously Hell is still pretty fair game there...Lucifer, he did...This stuff to me...like all the time…"Sam's eyes were blinking. Then the pain came. He leaned against the tree, gurgling his blood, whole body freezing, fire shooting out of his eyes before disappearing without burn traces. The rest of the fire rolled back and he leaned against the tree, noticing with horror that Dean had not let him go the whole time. Dean who had been burned as well but had not let go.

"Y-you sh-should go...I can f-feel it...I think I'm gonna…"Sam coughed up blood. Dean nodded.

"And so am I. We promised, remember? So, if Cas can't save you, then-"Dean climbed into the fire then, ducking his body between the twisted bars, until his chest was bumping against the same spear that drove Sam to the tree at the end of the metal maze.

"N'ya..You can't...You shouldn't...I don't want you to…"Sam was pleading and Dean smiled.

"Don't talk...Cas is coming. It will be okay." Dean had forgotten Mary. Mary who was crying now.

"Boys! Boys?! Dean! Sam!" Mary whose heart was beginning to understand.

They were out of her reach. Sam moaned and tossed his head as fire chewed him from the inside out.

"Sammy...Look at me. Nothing else. Don't think about nothing else, okay? Just look at me…"Dean gripped tighter to Sam's hands even as melting metal from the bike wrapped around their wrists and chained them together.

"Mm,, sorry…"Sam shook his head. And then he whined and whimpered like a child getting a tooth pulled.

"No, don't...It's not your fault. You didn't know- couldn't call for backup. S'okay. It doesn't hurt." Dean laughed.

"Yeah, it does." Sam shook his head, annoyed by the lie.

"It doesn't matter, though, huh? I can feel you in all of it, little brother. Not gonna leave you. Not now, not ever…." Dean was smiling despite the fact that his whole body was starting to shiver with the cold from Lucifer's cage the djinn had tapped into. His hair caught fire. Sam's teeth chattered and then electric fire rolled through the tree. Sam shrieked and Dean squeezed his hands, sending blood and melting metal up around them.

"I'm right here…Hang tough, buddy. Either way this goes. It'll be over soon."

"Dean...you're...you're bleeding n-now…"Sam's teeth chattered. The shrapnel from this ordeal had reached out and pinned Dean in the twisted remnants of the damned motorcycle.

"No, we are bleeding. I told you. It's okay. You be quiet now, save what you've got left in you, Sammy, for when Cas gets here." Dean's face twisted in a grimace of pain and he laid his face on Sam's trembling shoulder.

"D-D-Dee…"

"Shh…I know! But I told you...S'alright…S-Sammy, s'alright."

"One of us...sh-should walk away."

"Should, but we can't. I told you...No me if there ain't no you...I'm s-sorry but th-that part of-of the Zeke crap wudn't lyin' bout it…"

Mary screamed, running to the debris, making a flag out a burning piece of tire and a branch. Cas came screeching up in a truck, with Bobby 2.0 next to him. He let out a wail when he saw Mary.

"Please...My kids...my kids!" That was the first time she'd ever called them that. She didn't hear it until Bobby had her in his arms.

"They're my children, please!"Mary buried her face in Bobby's chest, bawling as the horrible reality of ice and fire and a lifetime of shattered hopes and dreams came down with this one wreck.

Cas strode into the flames. He felt too numb for tears now, the hovering presence of his grace canceling out the better part of the djinn's power and driving back Lucifer's cold. He pulled the molten bike away from Dean, who was now serrated, as he fell out of the metal net, hands still melted to Sam's hands. At first, Cas thought they were dead and screamed in agony. But that jarred Dean awake. Dean who coughed and begged-

"He's pinned, he's pinned, help him first, dammit!"

"Nuh-uh, M' good, but this dumbass got burnt…"Sam nodded to Dean, coughing up blood.

"Shut up, both of you! I'm healing you both. Dean, be still, damn everything!" Cas put one hand on Dean's chest as he slid to the ground. It took all the strength of his angelic back to pry the Winchester brothers hands free of the metallic grip, healing the melted skin in that motion. Then, he pressed a hand to Sam's chest, healing him constantly even as he painfully removed him from the impaling contraption grip.

Sam fell from the tree, into the burning grass. Dean scrambled to him and threw his arms around him. Cas gathered them under each arm and hauled them to the Impala pushing them both inside it. And he stayed with them, on his knees near the car, until Dean was calm enough to drive again. Then, Cas climbed in with them and they rode home together, having forgotten Mother Mary at the scene altogether.

"You know, you're gonna have to...to figure that out. I don't wanna….You don't need ta let anything keep you from figgerin out what you just saw. Lemme drive you home now…"Bobby gasped, as he put Mary in the truck. She curled up and cried into her knees.

"My children, Bobby. My children, and I-!" Oh, why hadn't she acknowledge it before today?


	19. Chapter 19

**Brothers and Vows-**

 **This chapter goes out especially to cammiemorris7 and to Thorns Have Roses. Thanks for all your reviews. This story probably would have stopped with chapter 1 if not for you.**

As it would turn out, Dean had scared Sam as much as Sam had scared Dean.

Big brother tried to swagger from the driver's seat like the situation was under his control. His mouth was open to give orders and his fists were curled to take the reins, but his knees were sinking sand.

At first sign of failing, Sam was a bullet to his shotgun seat and came around the Impala's nose, practically skating on the muddy tarmac to his brother's side.

Dean opened his mouth to say something but was silenced with wide-eyed surprise. Whether by freak adrenaline or some other spiritual power the Soul Eater had tapped into, none could tell. Sam scooped Dean up like a bride and carried him all the way back into the house.

Dean, of course, attempted to protest it at first. There were strangers in the house and this would look peculiar.

The strangers stood vigil in the front room as if this was a reception of sorts. They all should know by now that they had come to live under the roof of something domestically transient. And the look on their Chief's face told them all they needed to know about his reported accident. Blood and fire had done nothing to upset the man who had caged the Devil once. It was his brother, the painful pearl wedged between the clam shell his heart was locked up under. His brother had turned his face to alabaster. His brother had busted his chops like the surf to shoals with that jagged lip-tremor, shipwrecked expression.

"Are you...ar-ar-are you okay?" Sam's voice has the shivers, with all of the nerves of a fluttering heart at first signs of a bride. Cas stood back, panting, a flower girl to all the petals of glass and charred steal that were sprinkling from his coat. Dean's eyes went wide and snapped and crackled in the firework reflection of the crash's aftermath.

"Am I okay?! Wha…? Sam, you just got impaled! Are YOU freaking okay?!" Dean sat up and took both sides of Sam's face, arms having gone limp as wilted flowers even as his hands were vice grips. He was chattering. His tongue was sharply barbed, and it drew blood from his own heart, and Cas could see that his heart blossomed in its bruises. His heart was a wreath of roses, his tongue was a crown of thorns. For all the tongue lashing, he was spreading floral graces to his own condolences. This was a funeral he had canceled after all. And this was a wedding of sorts or a spontaneous renewing of vows. It recalled the memory of a promise made in a god-forsaken church, of a brother to brother and come whatever. Cas flinched. That was the night the angels fell and hope and glory had come to nothing. But Sam and Dean Winchester had made peace with each other and to them, that was a victory worth the history books.

"I made you a promise in that friggin church after all the tablet crap. Do you remember? Damn you, bringing things back up like you do. Damn it! Of course, I climbed into a fire to get you. I told you, dumbass...I told you a million times! Whatever means whatever! What even the Hell were you doing out there when you?-" Dean went on railing Sam. Sam was holding Dean now, in shaking arms, like something from some silly rom-com movie, arms draped around his shoulders. And just then, Cas realized he wasn't alone in the room.

"What...What is he...What is he talking about?" Mary, in tears at her own previous neglect, seeking understanding now.

"Oh, wow. This story isn't for the faint of heart and it may take a few decades to go into all of it. He's recalling the massive myth ark of their love and darkness. They've seen more cutthroat stakes than pirates. They were thicker than thieves, as you humans like to say, maybe because they were made from the same blood and that's thicker than the ink it would take for Metatron to write it all down." Cas took Mary to another seat in this den and gracefully sat her down. He knelt beside her then, drawing a deep breath. He paused, letting Sam and Dean tell their own story, which he would gladly narrate by and by.

"You look like getting mad at me for something like this. You've watched me die a handful of times, Dean. You know how many times I've had to watch you die over the years? Or did you completely forget, I don't know, Mystery Spot?" Sam's indignant expression and the way he drew his brother closer comically contrasted.

"A handful of times?! Really, you bitch?! I put you in the freaking ground with Lucifer. That was...That was…"Dean sputtered and then his hands clapped Sam's cheeks where they rested on them like he was applying aftershave.

"And maybe you like forgot about Jake Talley stabbing you in the freaking back, man? A handful of times?! It only took the one time and the one freaking handful of your blood to send me over the edge." Dean gritted his teeth.

"Mm, yeah, sure that was fair. Because later Lilith's freaking mutts ripped you to bits and I had handfuls upon handfuls of your freaking guts to clean up! You...you mugga friggin jerk! Throwing yourself into a freaking train wreck like that, what the heck, did you take your freaking idiot pills this morning, Dean?!" Sam shook Dean until his teeth chattered.

"What are you yelling at me for you whiny little bitch, I'm not the one who impaled you to the tree, dipshit! What were you thinking with what you did?!" Dean and Sam were ranting at each other now and everyone else was pretending not to be eavesdropping, even though their jaws were on the floor at some of the stuff they heard.

"What do they mean? Who was Lilith? What mutts? And what's a mystery spot?" Mary's hands were shaking. Cas took one of them.

"Well, that's the thing about Sam and Dean. This story has dragged on so long and bloody that even I don't remember everything they're talking about. Dean sold his soul once to save Sam who had been killed. I think that's what they mean. Dean was taken to Hell by Hellhound minions of Lilith the queen of the demons. I am the angel who rescued him, and that's how I came to know your boys. As for the mystery spot, I have no idea what that is. They don't tell me much about life before I met them." Cas frowned.

Mary sputtered.

"B-both of my babies have been in Hell? But Dean made it sound like only Sam was tortured in Hell?! When he said-I thought...I thought he meant he helped rescue Sam when he said..." Mary covered her mouth with her other hand.

"Well, Dean would be like that, wouldn't he? That's the only tour of the Pit that he would care about." Cas stood up finally and went to them both, just about the time that Jack shyly entered the room with a chalk-white face.

"Guys, um, guys?" Cas shook Dean, whose hand went up in a "wait your turn" type expression.

"I told you, damn it, a promise is a promise and you're not freaking welching on that deal. I mean, Imma tell you like our Bobby used to say to me. If you die before me, I'll freaking kill ya!" Dean's eyes were bugging now. Sam had let go of him if only so he could get some air himself. He'd covered his mouth with both of his hands and looked like he was going to be sick.

"Dean…"Cas' patient voice nearly made Mary cry out from laughter and sadness all at once. Dean looked up now, innocent expression on his face. By now he and Sam both saw Jack and snapped to attention.

"Hey there, kiddo. How you feeling?" Dean smiled. Sam reached out, seeing Jack's pale expression.

"You okay, bud? Look a little spooked." Sam frowned at Jack's suddenly trembling mouth. _Mary made a note that John used to say that._

"What do you mean am I okay?! YOU almost died!" Jack drove his fist into Sam's shoulder.

"Yeah,Sam, you almost died!" Dean jabbed a finger at Sam.

"Shut up, Dean! You almost died too." Jack jabbed a finger into Dean's scalp. Dean hissed in annoyance. He was about to say something but Cas was laughing at him which caught him off guard and shut him up. Jack was clearly not done.

"What the hell happened to you guys? And what are you in here fighting about?! Hellhounds? Mystery Spots? Getting stabbed in the back? I don't understand most of it but you two have had the most whacked out life I've ever heard of an I'm the Devil's kid!" Jack pulled at his hair. Sam spluttered. Jack turned on Dean.

"And you're gonna freaking explain it too because I need to know at least where some of my family came from. Why the hell are you two like you are anyway? Did no one ever explain to you that when you have a family and they care about you coming home and going ballistic fighting at each other after you freaking ALMOST DIED is like NOT COOL!" Jack slumped on the floor, glaring accusingly at Sam for an explanation. Sam stuttered.

"I swear it was an accident. Why are you all so pissed at me?" Sam pointed to himself.

"Because I'm really freaking tired of you dying, Sam! This is like the second time since I've been around that you freaking died and I've heard stories that you've died a lot more times than that." Jack slapped his knees. Sam stuttered.

"Yeah...You know, some of us really would like to hear the whole story...It's not your fault what happened tonight, but we're all still pretty upset by it." Mary pressed closer now, feeling that she had to try her luck. Dean looked at her astonished that she would do what he'd secretly wished she would do ever since she'd been back.

"Well, I told you,...I thought I told you already? The Soul Eater came at me, knocked the bike off the road, I flew into that tree…"Sam started to explain.

"Sammy, they mean the whole story of us. Like how we got to be batshit crazy." Dean leaned against the couch, exhausted.

"Well, more or less. Some parts of the story are really confusing. For example, what is a mystery spot?" Cas tilted his head.

"Trust me, you don't want to know. You guys have good memories about Gabriel and all that and it wouldn't be right to tell you guys about that." Sam bowed his head.

"Gabe? What does he have to do with that? See, you can't tell us and then not tell us!" Jack was getting progressively more annoyed and started coughing.

"Whoa-oh, okay, okay. Whatever you want me to say...I'll...Whatever, okay? I'm sorry. I didn't...I swear to God and all of you I did not mean to scare the bejeesus out of you tonight." Sam looked up at his Mom who had pulled up a chair.

"It's okay, honey. Really, but...We'd all feel better if you'd um...If you'd explain some of this stuff. Like, why did...If the Soul Eater just draws power out of a soul, then how come yours is ice and fire? What did...What did Lucifer?..." Mary's voice trailed away when Sam's face turned the color of a newspaper's ashes.

"Maybe we could start...smaller?" Mary cringed. Dean leaned up, more sympathetic to Sam now.

"The whole thing started when you died. And it only went downhill from there until Sam here decided to go to school and get a life and meet a beautiful girl named Jessica. Yellow Eyes burnt her up in a ceiling fire the same day I came to tell Sammy that Dad was missing. We went off on a wild manhunt for our Dad. We found him in time to fight Azazel, but Azazel possessed him…"Dean looked at his feet. And then, to their amazement, his eyes were blinking fast like he was trying hard not to cry.

"But our Dad, see he really really loved Dean and me. After Azazel,( the Yellow-Eyed Demon, Jack) ripped Dean's guts to bits, he ended up dying in a hospital. My Dad made a deal with the Yellow-Eyed Demon to save Dean but Dad went to Hell. After that, me and Dean went off on a mission to do away with the demon that killed our whole family, us included, before the end." Sam smiled.

"That literally makes no sense." Jack tilted his head.

Dean leaned up.

"Settle in, kid, cause not a damn bit of this bug ugly story is going to make sense. And by the time you'll understand everything from what a mystery spot is to why I made a weird promise to my brother in a church like something out of a ridiculous chick flick...Uh... you're gonna wish you hadn't asked. Trust me…"

By the end, it was just as they had said. Jack had asked questions until he was blue in the face. He laughed and he cried and then he cried more and there were some parts that he begged to know more about and wasn't told.

Finally, Jack got too tired. And Cas scooped him up and carried him to bed. He had been silent this entire while. He would fall asleep at the foot of Jack's bed later, having cried himself silly after the events of this day, stoic angel nature be damned.

But Mary still had questions. And now that she had her boys alone seated on the same couch, she couldn't help herself.

"Okay, so...It's not fair maybe, after everything, for me to want the unabridged version of this story, but...I still have so much to catch up on. Mother stuff. The details behind the devil….I should have been there growing up, you know? When you were both already 20 something and looking for Dad, I should have been there…When you were fighting a war you couldn't win and everyone blamed you both for it, I should have been there...When you were both burning in Hell, I should have-"Mary swallowed a sob. Sam looked at his still blood-stained hands. Dean cleared his throat.

"What do you want to know?" Dean's eyes were hopeful. This was a first.

"You...I want to know you. I don't know how to make sense of that. There's a lot of holes in this story. The John that played football with you and had Baby Sammy under his arm at the same time wouldn't have left you for weeks on end like the story you told me about his disappearing and how it didn't scare you at first…"Mary bit her lip. Sam nodded.

"Well, being absent was kind of his thing." Sam frowned. Dean was biting his knuckles now. Mary looked at him, amazed.

"Sam….I just realized. To hear you tell it, even the way you two were to each other and….and I never realized. He did love me! He did! Oh, he would have lost his cookies about what happened to us all them years…." Dean buried his face in his hands. Sam wrapped his arm around him.

"Yeah, we loved you and we missed you, Mom. Still do. And we've screwed up many times throughout lives as people and you've heard enough of the myth to know that now. But growing up we had Dad. And just like he was...We became who we are partly because of the version of Dad we knew and our broken little world." Sam smiled. Mary nodded.

"Tell me everything. I'm ready to hear it now."


	20. Chapter 20

**In the Midst of Gods and Monsters**

 **-The John Winchester segment of this story is for California. May your families band together in the midst of peril and tragedy.**

Now with all the scrolls of legend peeled away, Mary Winchester sat in a quiet den with two haggard, war-weary men that had once been broken boys. They were staring off into space, leaning slightly on each other as they recalled a man who was both father and commanding officer to their private warfare.

"Dad raised us in this impossible situation. And I fought with him...All the time I fought with him because I loved him. Because I wanted him to be a Dad and not just the demon recon revolutionary he'd turned into." Sam looked up slowly into Mary's eyes realizing only after the articulation that he'd commented on his thoughts aloud. Dean cleared his throat as if he would begin a more formal narration.

"You never knew me and Sam at our Sunday best, Mom. You met us at the tail end of a chew-toy whacked out life. You got the extra crispy leftovers of who we are and I really wish you'd known us when we weren't like that. When we were young guys and Dad, demon recon revolutionary and all, was still alive. He raised us to be warriors and that made us into brothers…"Dean smiled. And then he cleared his throat.

"But Sam's right. Dad was stuck in the middle of an impossible situation and he...He did what he could. I obeyed him...idolized him to an unhealthy thought pattern because I loved him. Because I wanted him to be my Dad and not just a drill sergeant." Dean and Sam exchange a look. And then Sam smiled.

"But he did love us very much, in his own warped way. There was this one hunt in particular where we had seriously ticked an Ancient Hawaiian fire god. You remember that, Sammy? We were in the San Mateo Canyon region on a regular werewolf hunt when we woke the old gods up and started a monster mash right there in the middle of the So-Cal wilderness?" Dean looked at Sam. Sam's eyes were wide.

"Oh, yeah...I'd never forget that. Dad saved us in every way we could have been saved, but he didn't baby us either. If you asked me when I became a grown-up, I'd have to say it was that day." Sam looked at Mary with his eyes shining. But Dean was the one who'd decided to tell the story.

"I was 19-years-old. Sam was 15. Dad said this region probably had answers, that this pack of wolves finally had answers, that we would finally close in on the damn thing that killed you if we just could get close to what the fang bangers of that region called Pele's pit or something. Dad seriously thought Pele was like a sire werewolf. We had no idea he was a like he-she fire demon out for blood against hunters…"

" _This is kind of like camping! That is if camping sucked and was ungodly hot. It's like the Devil's armpit out here. Why the hell are we even doing this, Dean?!" Sam had his bare feet on the back window of Dad's truck. He'd laid down flat on top of the gearboxes letting his sweaty bangs fan out upside down. One hand held a rifle to his chest, the other batted at horse flies. Dean stood beside him drenched in sweat, a bandana tied around his head. He was holding a rifle across his knees._

" _You know, now's not the time for your sassy BS, Sammy." Dean looked up. Dad stood with a 12 gauge staring into the distant forest. His steady silence spoke volumes as if thunder rolled from his feet like red carpets to the wild. Dean forgot the tongue-lashing he'd gotten about 20 minutes ago even forgetting what it had been about. Dad put off this aura that earned instant respect despite the sometimes mean behavior toward his oldest._

 _Sam sat up, noticing a change in the older Winchester. He twitched his upper lip and Dean couldn't help but hum soft laughter at the beginnings of facial hair Sammy had been trying to grow for an entire month._

" _Dad? Why are we hunting werewolves in the broad daylight? I thought you said they liked night time and the full moon?" Sam looked at Dean. Dean felt nervous without knowing why. Dad was being strangely patient with Sammy's incessant questions and sass._

" _Dad...What's wrong?" Dean drew nearer his father. John turned around. To Dean's amazement, there was pure terror brewing under the surface of the coffee dark that was John's eyes. He smiled._

" _Stand up, Sam. We're going to do this on foot."John looked sternly at Sam. His tone was enough to silence whatever question Sam was about to ask. John and Sam argued most of the time, but when things got really serious, the two like thinkers worked together. To his amazement, it was Dean who spouted off a question._

" _Why? I-I thought you said we were just on stakeout duty this time. We...we're not hunting a wolf are we?" Dean heard the shakiness in his own voice. John's face softened, seeming to suddenly remember the ribbing he'd just given the oldest, which was actually about their daylight position as well._

" _No, we're not. We're hunting Pele. Thought he was a myth, but...he's real. All the signs are here. This guy...He's a mean SOB, boys. And if we don't leave this spot, we're liable to be sucked right into the middle of his blazing path." John smiled when Sam's jaw snapped open._

" _WHY THE HELL DIDN'T YOU SAY SO BEFORE?!" Sam would have gotten in trouble except for the instant look of sheer panic on his face. Ever since he was little, Sam had been afraid of fire. Dean was too, but he would never say anything to Sam about the real reason they both felt this way. That they had been at the scene of their own mother's funeral pyre…._

" _Sam, look at me, son. Front and center. Didn't tell you because I didn't know who were dealing with until we got out here. I'm sorry, boys. Yeah, this was supposed to be a recon mission but missions go south. You cannot and you will not panic, got that?" John gave Sam a little bit of a shake. Sam's eyes snapped around to his Dad understanding that they were already in danger by his tone. Dean was the one that was starting to panic. He was amazed that he was choking on the urge to vomit now._

" _That goes for you too, champ." John was more sympathetic when he looked up at Dean. Neither of the older Winchesters had ever told Sam, but Dean remembered seeing his mother as she'd been in her last few moments. He was more than a little panicky and phobic like Sammy was in his subconscious. He was traumatized and mortified._

" _Dean...Look at me, son." John took Dean's shoulders. He made him look at him dead in his eyes. Dean felt raw terror ripping through him like wildcat teeth, but for one split second looking into his Dad's storm cloud eyes, he was totally calm. John nodded._

" _Dean, I'm going to cut a path. You and your brother need to put the rifles on your back and take up those stakes I put in the back, the ones made of driftwood. Got that? That fire is coming, boys. We've got to get a move on and I mean now." John nodded. Dean swallowed and turned to Sam._

" _Why...Why can't we just take the truck?" Sam's voice cracked. He had already grabbed the stakes that Dean was told to get but they were shaking in his hands._

" _Sammy, you're gonna be okay." Dean patted Sam's chest. Sam looked at John as if demanding an answer. John drew a deep breath, acknowledging that this was one time Sam needed an explanation._

" _There's a creek down that way, Sammy. If we can get to the water we might be able to survive what's coming." John hid the panic in his voice well._

"All these years later, and it never occurred to me that this was his worst fear coming back to life again. A fire had taken his wife and now a fire was coming for his kids. For Dad, that was something worse than getting killed. But he was rock steady even in the face of his worst nightmare and he was doing it for me because my head was shattering right off my shoulders." Dean swallowed, gripping his knees.

By this time, Castiel had come back. He was going to stay away. But his heart had been aching to know these things, and the ache had become louder than the tears he'd cried at the foot of Jack's bed. Mary startled when Cas sat down next to her.

"I'm sorry...I should I should probably let you all um…"Cas tried to find an excuse for his presence.

"You are part of our family. And you're staying for the rest of this story. Besides, you were the one who was with my boys when I couldn't be." Mary took Cas' hands. Cas smiled at Dean. Dean's hand covered his face. Sam put a hand on Dean's back realizing that he would have a hard time admitting this story in front of the angel he'd always put on a pedestal and the mother near the heart of his pain.

"It's true. We were always afraid of fire, after what happened to you, Mom. It's ironic that the three of us burned in Hell before the end. But we burned for the very same reason every time and that was family." Sam smiled as he rubbed Dean's shoulders. Dean mastered himself again.

"But there was this one time that we climbed out of a fire and it was John Winchester who saw to it that we made it out. That fight, that hunt with Pele actually set him on the path to finally understanding that the Colt was real. I found a note in his journal about it later." Dean drew a breath looking Mary in the eyes. He was determined to make peace with her now that his heart was bleeding in her hands.


	21. Chapter 21

**The Baptism of John**

 **-This chapter was inspired by I See Fire by Ed Sheeran-**

By the time they had reached this part of the story, Dean was cracking. His hand shot out to Sam's and took it and clutched at it hard until his knuckles were white as he talked. It was a completely subconscious move until Dean became too emotional to talk much more.

"We were in the bush, for an hour, when Pele, he transformed into his goddess form. And he...He looked like…"Dean's eyes fluttered and he looked down.

"She looked like you." Sam swallowed. Mary's eyes opened wider, understanding.

"Like I did at the end?" Mary bit her lip.

Dean gasped. Sam reached his arm around his brother's shoulders and pushed his face into the small of his chest. Sam leaned his head down into Dean's hair and cupped his chin like someone does when they hold a lamb.

"She cast fire with her every step. And she was screaming, God, the screaming. The cliff slipped out and gave its way. Dad, he had one last chance. To save us. It would probably cost him too. But he took our rifles and stashed them in the rock bed. Then he took us, one under each arm and he made for the creek." Sam took a shaky breath. But Dean had gathered him and he told the next part.

"When I hit the water, I was half out of my head."

 _Dean wasn't aware until he was flying through mid-air that this was the end. All he saw was all the broken boy had ever seen. His mother in the middle of her halo. And the end. The end of the end of the end of the-_

 _His chest hit the water. But his head, his head was tucked tightly against a man's shoulder. His hand went up and pressed firmly over Sammy's beating heart._

 _Dean's eyes snapped open. He was in a creek, 15 feet of water or so. He was tucked like a little kid under his Dad's arm. Sam was under the other arm, leaning over his shoulder to sling the sopping hair out of his eyes._

" _God….Please, God…"John's voice. The only time that Dean ever remembered hearing him pray. Only once. And then Dean wondered after it. The baptism of John by fire and water and the blood running from his face as the shrapnel had hit him and not his boys. Dean had to wonder if there was a God or if there were angels or if Mom was really back there in Pele's fire._

" _God, if you're out there...Then there's got to be a way to put an end to gods and monsters. Okay, so you want me to believe you're the number one? Prove it. Give me something I can use...to save my family." John held his sons closer. Dean felt it. Felt his heart nearly bursting, beating against his chest. He looked up into Sam's wide young eyes that were looking on at a landscape ablaze._

 _Strangely enough, there in his father's arms, he couldn't look away from Sam's eyes. They were alive. For this one moment, they were alive. Now in a moment, that might change. In a breath, it would end in fire. Tonight, they might die, but they would all die together. The Winchesters. A family for once, here in the blazes._

" _Dean?" Sam smiled. And that smile...quiet and resolved, and the slight tremor of laughter with it, brought John's eyes open._

" _Boys?" John put his hands in each of his sons' hair. Dean sputtered. Sam's hand reached out and his fingers curled in the amulet he'd given Dean when they were little. Dean could feel it. The bond between them ran from the breath in his throat straight up Sam's fingers. Stronger than cords or symbols, it would outlast the burning trees, the splitting rocks that tore like teeth from bleeding gums of the mountain._

" _We're here, Dad." Dean reached up to the amulet, closing his fist over Sam's hand. Sam grinned. A tree collapsed in the background, casting up a shadow. John drew them closer, pushing them down the river with steady swimming feet, even as debris and ashes peppered the current. The waters ran the color of blood and broken tiger lilies._

 _Dean felt tears in his eyes unbidden, hidden only by the smoke. This was the last time. It was the last time they would all be together like this, so he thought. But it wasn't the first time. It wasn't the first time they'd watched the world burn. This wasn't the first time Dad held him or his little brother while he looked on at desolation. One dark night, long ago, he remembered…._

 _Dean cried. He hadn't in years in years, but he cried for Mary as the world burned down. And John cried and Sam cried, but no one ever spoke about it again._

"Only time I ever remembered hearing Dad pray. But that...That moment...That amazing grace where we burned together. You have to understand, Dean, that's why. Why I believed. That was amazing, that was enough. And I had faith... For so long. That there were angels, a higher power…" Sam smiled, eyes looking off into oblivion.

"But there were...There were angels! God was real all along. Your father when he prayed was heard in heaven…"Cas' mouth had fallen open.

Sam looked sadly at Cas, bottom lip trembling.

"Don't you see? I believed, but when the day came for the truth to reach me it was already too late. There was no salvation. Not for me." Sam swallowed. Dean nodded and looked up.

"You...You always said they were watching out for us. Angels…"Dean smiled at Mary. Mary whose eyes were running now with the tears of holy baptism, with the final proofs of understanding.

"I believed you. So, when they came for us. When you were right and I found out that angels had been watching….Had been watching and doing nothing! Like they had been waiting for the world to change or worse. There was a time...Damn it, there was a time that I hated you…Both of you..."Dean swallowed eyes watering a bit. He wouldn't look at Cas or Mary. He turned to Sam again.

"There were three of us once. The world consisted of three people once. Two boys and their mentally broken Dad. We climbed out of that river and walked right into Pele's lair. Now, she had stirred up an inferno around us, but her cave was empty. And I wouldn't know, not for years, that God actually heard Dad pray. There was a carving in that cave, a rune code, that eventually led Dad to a legit spell. One that was used to make the Colt. He thought, if he couldn't find the gun, he could make the spell. Whichever came first." Dean cleared his throat.

Sam smiled and then he nodded.

"We came to learn the truth about mothers and angels. It seems that God paid us back in the end. He gave us back the first angel that ever looked over us and then he gave us one with wings for a while." Sam put a hand on both Mary and Cas' shoulders.

Mary, to her amazement, burst into tears. And now, at last, the wayward mother was crying for her family. To think of them alone at the end of days, washing away down the mountainside, like tears from the earth's own eyes.

It was Dean then. Dean who had cried and languished on that day long ago. Dean, whose role now as the oldest biological Winchester man gave him the power of forgiveness. He reached out and gathered her to his chest. He pushed her face to his shoulder as protectively as he'd been pressed when amazing grace had saved him.

Sam reached around Mary from behind, smoothing her hair. She should be the one comforting them. She was the reason why they'd been lost, wasn't she? And yet, here they were again, baptized in compassion, just like their father had led them to be.

"If I...If I could ever pay back the debt that my kind owes…" Cas shook himself. Sam laid one side of his face in his mother's hair like he'd never gotten to do and turned to smile at Cas.

"You've paid in blood and sweat and tears and worse. You're one of us and don't owe angels or men anything."Sam nodded and traced his thumb over Cas' drawn face. And for the first time, Cas could understand. He was looking back into the eyes of all of them who prayed. And now he knew who men were and why they believed.


	22. Chapter 22

**Bloodstains and Flannel**

The night grew deeper. Others had long gone to bed when Dean finally decided to make peace with Sam. The others had to be reached out to. It was for them that they had opened up. But what their loved ones didn't understand was that it expelled all energy for Sam and Dean to talk about the story of their lives. They were so numb after every waking tragedy. It was like walking on the bottom of the ocean and being asked to breathe.

Dean helped Mary to bed. Cas went back to Jack. And Sam went to the laundry room and peeled out of his bloody shirt and jeans. Standing there in his underwear, he was running stain remover through his bloody fannel. He scrubbed at the weary fabric with a sponge, feeling the weight of his oceans crashing against him. He pressed his bare knees against the washing machine, trying to calm his frazzled nerves with the rhythm of something mundane and familiar.

He slammed the utility closet door, hands shaking. Numb. So, so numb. As if his bones were removed and replaced with cotton.

He felt Dean slide into the room, cool like the presence of water. Sam never bothered to look up from where he leaned against the utility closet door. He could hear the sound of fabric whisper as Dean pulled out of his own bloody flannel and jeans, standing there in his underwear and spreading blood.

Sam stayed where he was as he heard Dean scrubbing his own laundry. He felt Dean's eyes on him, but he didn't lift his hollow head to acknowledge him. If he moved, it wouldn't be the same. Dean's eyes were bathing him with compassion and he needed to feel clean tonight.

That was something that his well-meaning but clueless loved ones were unaware of. After all that the brothers had been through, and being men, the less verbal expression the better when it came to stomaching all of this. So numb. All of the words in their daily bank burned up. A game of scrabble rigged to the Inquisition. Silence here, shared and lonely, was more comforting between the two of them than a baby's swaddling.

Dean, at last, was done with his own laundry and threw it in the machine with Sam's. Then he came to the closet. Sam lifted his head an inch knowing that Dean was about to take this a mile further. Of course, he couldn't leave it alone. Not after the kind of Hell he'd been through today.

Dean grabbed Sam's shoulders and whipped him around, roughly slamming him against the door by his shoulders. Sam didn't make a sound but felt the ache of this action in his gut, plucking off the bandage of this last ultra-pressurized tragedy. The ache that went up Sam's spine hurt so pleasantly he nearly cracked a smile. It was the pain of manhandling and for a brother that was almost as good as being cuddled when you were a child.

Dean was silent too. He just pinned him to the door and glared at him. He gave him the thrice-over stare, making a note of the blood that had yet to be cleaned up.

Sam's hands went to Dean's wrists. Dean shoved him harder against the closet. Sam's grip tightened around Dean's wrists. The fire in Dean's eyes froze over along with the Hell inside him. And Sam understood. God help him, he got it. Dean could swear off talking from now on and he'd get it.

Dean swallowed, shaking his head as he bowed, hands still thrust to Sam's shoulders. Sam's knees gave out. He slid down the door, clenched hands at Dean's wrists dragging him and his brother down into other piles of flannel and jeans.

They didn't need to air their dirty laundry verbally. Their bloody life was laying around them in the form of crimson soaked shirts and scarlet drenched, lacerated jeans. Slashes, mud, spilled bleached...It pooled around them like a life driven into the dust. One life. One heart that had squeezed so much blood onto the canvas of disaster as to paint it black with unresolved wrong.

Sam let go of Dean's wrists. They just stayed there for a moment in the bloody laundry. Dean's tired eyes floated up to meet Sam's. They were talking with their eyes. It was the science of telephone lines. The impulses of shared sight were beats down an invisible cable dialing out numbers, framing thoughts in math and not words. They were brothers and this was how it was done.

Dean grunted in annoyance. They were gonna have to wash all this crap eventually. Put more clothes on. Sam leaned against the closet door again, scattered socks and sleeves twisting around his ankles. He let a heavy breath of agreement. He didn't want to fool with this dirty laundry either, but that was life.

He saw Dean's shoulders shivering after a second and threw him a clean shirt. Dean caught it and pressed it to his chest. Then, he slowly eased himself to his feet and held a hand out to Sam. Sam took it and let himself be eased to his feet.

Dean stood for a long moment, tapping his bloody feet in the spilled bleach, cupping Sam's hand by the knuckles in his palm so his thumb could trace the scar. He remembered Sam's mental illness along with so much else. He swallowed, eyes bloodshot now. They may as well be made of lead as they ghosted over Sam's face again. And then he smiled. And Sam felt that smile in his own mouth as if he'd kissed him. It thrilled straight through the cotton of his numb soul and maybe caught a spark.

Dean scooped some jeans off the floor and tossed them at Sam's chest. Thus they proceeded to piece their lives and laundry back together until they were fully clothed again and the bloody pieces were sorted. Not a word was spoken, but a thousand things that needed saying had been talked out. So a wicked night had ended with a much better day. The dawn broke about the same time that the alarm bell for the new hunters had gone off. The brothers continued to mill about their silence, to coffee pots and pancakes and only spoke again when they were spoken too.


	23. Chapter 23

**Ride or Die-**

 **Warning: Some violence in this chapter may disturb younger readers. Sorry, but if you watched this show through seasons 1-5 the canon used to be like this too.**

Jack had felt the adrenaline. He wanted to hunt and he wanted to live before whatever this sickness was finally caught up with him. Which is how he ended up in a blazing Greyhound with Dean at the wheel, Sam slicing Michael hybrid Skinwalkers to bits with razor wire and the jagged end of a seat belt, and Cas trying to pluck civilians from the blazing seats.

All Jack could do was hold on to two sets of burning seat belts, trying to use his last strength to keep it together. Normally, he'd be beating himself up for how he was contributing to this situation. But this time, he was just kneeling there, holding on for dear life, awestruck by the complete savagery of the Winchesters.

It was something that he'd not been told by the stories. All their memories had been told through the lens of their bond with each other. Jack had never realized that Sam and Dean's lives had been so brutal until he saw Sam in uncensored combat this time. Blood ran from his hands as he fought with the pieces of the collapsing bus. When a Skinwalker kicked him in the face, his hands shot up and he shrieked at it, ripping pieces of the bus roof straight from the frame to slide into its face.

And Dean, Dean was driving with his feet, and shooting off the bus full of Skinwalkers with a machine gun of silver bullets. He was picking them off and killing them as Sam was holding them back from the screaming, crying people. Just long enough for Cas to pluck them free.

"Jack! 'Member them driving lessons? Get over here!"Dean shouted over open fire, jarring Jack from his stupor. Jack sluggishly slid forward to where Dean was all but bodily slamming him in front of the bus' wheel.

"Dean! I don't know how to drive a BURNING BUS!" Jack heard his own voice shouting over the sound of the backdoor blasting from the frame. Cas howled as he held the walls together.

"You're not driving, kiddo, you're crashing with style. Just hold the wheel and try to keep us on the road!" Dean pulled a knife from his boot. He grabbed Sam's shoulder from behind, linked arms with him and they used each other to propel Dean into a high fly kick.

Jack was supposed to be watching the road. But he was instead watching the Winchesters and how they turned into one machine function of clockwork violence when they were in the middle of hand-to-hand. Jack loved them. Immensely. But at this moment, he was just a little bit terrified by them too. They were juggling one knife and blazing bus parts between each other like a circus of death. Even Cas, an angel who had seen Millennia of war, had wide eyes as he watched them from his stance at the end of the bus.

Jack kept them on the road until the wheels blew out from beneath the bus. The bus pitched and rolled and skated on its side. And in that ruin of the world, the strangest sound rose up. Dean, laughing like a hyena, carefully easing civilians out the shattered windows, whilst he took silver pistols to the remnant monsters.

"Ride or die, Sammy! Woo-ah!" Dean was jeering, to the wide-eyed awe of the people he'd just saved.

To Jack's surprise, Sam's voice was completely steady of nerves when he answered back.

"Dean! The timing. We're on the clock, man!"

And to answer them all, Cas pushed a hole through the melted floorboards turned roof and let in the sun.

"Everyone stay calm and completely ignore these two. They enjoy their job a little too much."

Even as he lay there with his back to a blazing dash, pieces of glass in his hair and a melted steering wheel in his hands, Jack was smiling. What a ride his short life had been up until now. Faith of his fathers, bond of those brothers, freewill over destiny, win or lose, ride or die.


	24. Chapter 24

**The Bible Never Mentioned Us-**

 **A/N: If updates seem like they're slowing down a lot in the near future, it's because I'm a news reporter. I've had some pretty tight deadlines recently. Popping over here to relieve occupational stress. ;)**

 **AN 2/**

 **The dates in this chapter were based on the fact that most of the canon events mentioned in this chapter happened at the beginning of May for each season and Sam was born on May 2nd.**

 **This was inspired by Birdy's "Let Him Go" which is a version of Passenger's "Let Her Go" on BBC Live Lounge. This song was the song that helped me overcome suicide as a teenager. If you are experiencing depression, hold on for a while. There may be no saving us. The Bible never mentions us, but life is sacred and we can share it for a while.**

Jack had resigned himself to his fate. Sam had not. Sam was desperate to save him, to please him in any way he could. So, when Jack decided to host a birthday party for everybody in the bunker so he could celebrate with them one last time, Sam jumped at the idea. Dean, however, was not pleased.

"I don't understand...Jack wants this and needs this. Why are you so tense about it?" Sam was agitated. Dean was frosting one of three cakes on their kitchen table. Other members of their ragtag family were milling around the kitchen, filling snack orders and decorations that were part of their communal party.

"No reasons. It's cool, man. Why don't you go check on the kid? He's trying to hang a pinata in the library." Dean smiled coolly. Sam tilted his head. He took Dean's arm by the bicep.

"Are you okay?" Sam bit his lip. Dean's face was totally calm, but his lips were pursed a little. Dean always formed that little fretful shape with his lips when he was carefully controlling his tears. Dean smiled at Sam. And it was a ridiculous, ivory white and ridiculous one that let all his teeth catch in the sparkling candles Cas was testing.

"Mm, no, I'm good, bud. Go check on Jack." Dean nodded. Sam's face said he wasn't buying Dean's bill of goods for a second but he could also clearly tell that Dean didn't want to talk about this in front of everyone else.

Mary wouldn't leave it alone.

"Come on, Dean. We can all tell that you're lying. What is it? You're not much for parties?" Mary tilted her head, smiling. Dean grew suddenly defensive.

"No...No, I like parties fine. It's birthdays that I don't care much about." Dean swallowed, trying to keep the fake smile flickering across his face. Cas' eyes went wide. He already knew where this was going. He was the one who heard Dean's silent prayers and right now he was subconsciously begging God not to make him confess to this.

"I know your Dad was hard on you growing up, but birthdays are special. We could make this one different for you, Dean. I mean I know it's not your actual birthday but we could make it sort of a celebration for the first 40 we all failed to celebrate…" Mary's voice was tender and sad. Dean's shoulders arched like he was expecting a beating.

"Oh, no...If I can have a case of brews and a good action flick on my birthday I'm golden. It's because of Sam that I don't like birthdays…."Dean smiled. He was completely oblivious to what he'd just said. Mary shook her head.

"What? So he's like a little dictator about celebrations or something? Does he make them miserable?" Mary laughed. But Dean slammed down the cake platter back arching all the way like a cat whose paw was stung by a wasp.

"Yes...yes he makes his birthday, in particular, a god-awful, hellish experience." Dean's voice cracked. Mary tilted her head.

"Sam's not the kind to make a big deal about himself?" Mary laughed hoarsely, not yet understanding. Dean stood up all the way slapping the cake plate away from him.

"Oh, he wouldn't. But that didn't keep him from dying on his damn birthday three freaking times!…" Dean's voice was a claymore cleaving straight through the bones of everyone in proximity. Mary flinched looking up slowly.

Dean excused himself from the room.

Cas reached to continue frosting the cake only to find that Dean had made off with the knife.

"Don't...Mary, don't go after him. This is a problem that Sam will have to help with…"Cas held his breath and closed his eyes. He had seen what Dean had seen.

 _Look at me. It's not even that bad. It's not even that bad, alright?_

Except that it was. Cas shook his head. For Dean, in that brief second had seen a dark and stormy night years and years ago...The night of Sammy Winchester's 24th birthday.

 _"SAM!" Dean had never felt a greater rush of relief in his life. There was his brother, standing in the mud of Cold Oak. He was holding his wounded arm, panting as he trudged away from the gore and evil of Azazel's gladiator field._

 _"Dean!" Sam's face brightened upon sight. Dean was here. This was the first night of the rest of their lives, of all that they survived and would survive. Dean's heart had jumped with happiness to think that here he was as young as he'd never be again. Butch and Sundance they would grow old together._

 _Unless._

 _"Sam, watch out!" All of Dean's hopes sank to his stomach right before the meteorites of his life blasted apart in him. It was funny how in three steps Jake Talley had taken all of that away. A knife wedged into the thin little cord that was Sam's spine. And a bird chirp cry from the little brother who would never get older._

 _One last moment...Dean caught him. Watched him, in denial as Sam's eyes floated over his face, letting his brother's face be the last thing he ever saw._

 _"Sam!" Dean shook his brother. His brother, so alive a moment ago, stumbling falling, head rolling, blood filling up Dean's hand._

 _Say something…Say anything! Dean had thought it screamed it from the center of his soul. And it echoed back on him. This boy who had followed him everywhere. Whose first and last steps had been walking toward him. Whose first and last word had been used to frame his name._

Dean had retreated like a snail rolled in sea salt into a boiler room's impossible dark gearbox. A knife was in his hands, but this one was covered in cake frosting. In the birthday cake frosting that acted like a veneer to hide all the breaks in Dean's heart because this history had a way of repeating itself. Another day in another life had dawned. Sam's 35th birthday had come and gone in Apocalypse world.

 _"We're getting close...Can't you feel it?" His smile...His smile was the last light in this fallen world. Dean's heart thrilled with relief._

Dean had driven the knife into his palm without knowing it. Blood welled between his fingers. His blood and Sam's blood. The blood of the same parents flowed through their veins, didn't it? But Sam...He saw Sam in that cave with the vampires. Sam...Who had followed Dean down this dark road, whose first steps and last had been spent trying to get to Dean...Whose first and last word was his name...Again….

Dean choked, as the blood ran from his lip which he'd just bitten. Because he recalled now, so many years later than the first time, that it was also on or near Sam's birthday the day the deciding battle of the Apocalypse had been. The memory came back unbidden.

 _Lucifer's fist stopped mid-air becoming Sam's once more. The light rose into the boy's eyes. It was the dawn of his 27th year alive and it was the dusk of all his days at once. And Dean was there in the end. Dean was still there. Still clutching his arm even though everything he touched surely died._

 _"It's okay, Dean. It's all gonna be okay…"_

 _It wasn't._

 _"I've got him…."_

 _And he was gone._

Hours passed. The birthday party came and went and Dean was not found. Sam was so busy trying to make Jack comfortable and happy while Rowena searched for a cure, he hadn't noticed his brother was hiding from the light.

"Hey. Where's Dean?" Sam swung by the kitchen again. Where Mary and Bobby were sitting, chatting over coffee.

"Oh, he left. I upset him. It was an accident but…"Mary smiled like it didn't matter like her apologetic smile made that okay. But hadn't she looked for him? Could she really think that one bonding conversation made it alright? Dean needed her…

"Upset him? How?" Sam tilted his head, feeling a stab go through his heart.

"Oh, he...I kept prying. I wanted to know why Dean doesn't like birthdays." Mary smiled.

"What? He doesn't like birthday parties...He...He never told me that? What did he say?" Sam swallowed, oblivious. Mary shrugged.

"He...um...He said you...you died three times on your birthday?" Mary frowned.

Sam felt his heart shatter. Oh. Oh God. He'd not remembered that little detail. His own birthday had been so far from his mind for so so long…. For one simple reason that Dean had left out.

"Oh, Dean...It would be like him to neglect to mention he also died on my birthday once…or more?"Sam's breath caught. Mary looked up amazed. Sam had fled the room, looking for his brother.

Sam was calling him almost as soon as he'd slipped from the kitchen. His fingers shook, smearing purple cake dye like blood and bruises of their lives over the screen of his phone. He swallowed, ringing Dean 7 or 8 times.

 _Say something…_

But Sam knew he wouldn't say anything. Because Dean...Dean was near to giving up. He could shoulder almost anything. Anything but celebrations. Because birthdays and funerals had something in common for Dean Winchester. They all ended with fire and smoke and wishes that never came true.

"Dean!" Sam called out hopelessly and the house called back to him. And the sound of Dean's heart giving up….

And then he heard it, Dean's phone ringing. From the gearbox of the old boiler room contraption.

Sam climbed in it, nearly ripping the door off. He was afraid. Afraid of what Dean might do to himself now with the way that things were going….

Sam climbed in. There...There was Dean head leaning against the boiler shaft. Steam had made his hair stand on ends. Blood ran from his lip and from his hand that he'd pressed to his heart. And Sam would have thought he was dead, the way he lay, but tears ran from his eyes.

Sam pressed closer to him. He took the knife from his fingers and cut a piece from his shirt, wrapping the band around Dean's hand. Dean's lips twitched and he looked up at the roof.

"It was the happiest day of my life...The day you were born. My first friend and my last had debuted on the world." Dean sniffed back a laugh and then he sobbed. A soft cracking sob. A horrified dry heave sound.

"You're gonna ask me if I'm okay. I'm not…"

"Dean?" Sam pressed closer. Dean shook his head. His eyes closed and tears streamed from his eyes.

"You had your peace...Before I brought you back. If you had never gotten older. If I had left you alone. I thought I was doing the right thing, seeing to it that you lived past 24...Sammy...It's my fault you suffered all these years…"Dean beat his head against the pipe.

Sam had no response to that. He burst into tears too. He took Dean's face letting the tears run with the dye from the cake frosting. Dean let out another shaking breath. Sam laughed and then Dean laughed. And then he gasped.

"You would never have gotten older...You'd never have had to walk through the middle of all that…"Dean chewed his lip and blood ran down his chin. Sam thumbed it away.

"And the world would have burned." Sam swallowed.

"When you saved me….You saved the world." Sam gasped. Dean took Sam's face in fierce bloody hands.

"I see you dying every time I close my eyes. I see you dying and living. You could have had Jessica...I pulled you away from her. Your dreams. Every dream. Gone so fast. Because of me. I would have died for you again and again and again. Make Mystery Spot look like something fun. To keep you from that. To let you have a life. And I'll be damned,...so much worse than what happened to me downstairs...Sam! I'm the reason why you…"Dean let out a soft cry through his teeth.

"I hate your birthday. And I love it. Because once upon a time, you were a tiny, innocent little baby wrapped in a blue blanket on that day. And little innocent baby brother that Mom put in my arms, one that cried and turned red in the face until his tiny hand latched onto my fingers. All your dear life hanging on to me, like I was your hope. But just like that you were an innocent baby brother pushed into my arms by Dad and the whole damn world was burning down." Dean bit his lip, eyes popping wide open and blood mixed with his tears again.

"Blink again...Just once. And once again you're an innocent little brother dropped in my arms by a crazy with a knife. And that was the last time. The last time you were shiny eyed and innocent and in my arms. You...You were mine. And I couldn't protect you!" Dean cupped Sam's face.

"And you may be here in the body, but don't kid yourself. The you that you were, my little brother, he died a long, long time ago. I didn't know how much that I…"He still couldn't say it but it was known. He'd only ever known how much this love...When he'd been forced to let go. Sam nodded. He knew that feeling.

"I never stopped...Sam...I never stopped grieving. I couldn't save you! I couldn't save you…" Dean shook his head holding Sam's face. He screamed but it was muted by his teeth and came out as a sigh instead. Sam shook his head.

"No, Dean...But it's not your fault. You were never gonna be able to save me or my dreams because there was no salvation...mm...Not for me. That's the way it is, Dean. If I didn't go into the fire, the world wouldn't be here. In this case, I was Isaac, Jake was Abraham with the knife...But for you being the Righteous Man, but for being the ram that got stuck in the thicket our lives were not a Bible story. The Bible never mentioned us. There would be no one to take my place." Sam's eyes were wide. Dean shook his head.

"It's not. It should be me taking your place. Every time. That would be my happy ending…"Dean swallowed.

"Yeah, but then this would be a fairy tale. But Dean, there was never any storybooks that were gonna save me. Not the gospel true ones, not the evening news...Not the legends or the myths. There was for real no saving me. There's no saving me, in the end. This will end bloody. This will end bad." Sam shook his head. Dean was bawling again.

"Shh...You always knew it was gonna be that way. Honest to God...There by the grace, Dean, you always knew it was gonna be like that. I can't be saved. You can't be saved. And together we're the scapegoats and the whipping boys...But we save the world...And...And we can share it for a while." Sam smiled. And then Dean was hugging him, fiercely. Holding onto him who was never his to keep.

"Pppplllleaasee…." He hissed into Sam's shoulder.

But the Universe whispered "No."


	25. Chapter 25

**Coffee Break**

 **Named for the time of my work schedule when I got to write it. ;)**

They had to get away. It wasn't too much to ask their wayward mother to look out for Jack if she couldn't be there for them, was it? No, Dean ruled, it wasn't. So Mary stayed with Jack and Cas went on a recon run and Sam and Dean hunted because that's what they did when nothing else made sense. When they were as lonely as bones in the desert, the open road was there. Their car was their nanny the road their cradle and they went rocking down it to battle and death and the darkness they knew so well...

A long dark highway led them to nowhere but a roadhouse. And it looked so familiar like something from an old movie, or so they thought. Unbeknownst to them, cast in black and white, the movie they remembered was the film reel of their own sad days.

They pressed in bones cold, shoulders bumping. Streetcars cast up sleet and snow stuck to them. Sam's eyes cast up the dust of the 5 o'clock shadow that was dancing down his chin again. Dean sighed within. He didn't like his brother's returning beard because it was the waves of youth receding into the ocean of time. It had to be. He'd let it be tonight. He'd need to let it all just be.

So, he breathed in.

"Wow…"Sam had said it under his breath. Dean hadn't noticed it. Not yet. But the smell of cedar decks splashed with PBR and the sound of rock songs as old as the vinyl they were recorded on called it all back. This place and everything and everyone in it was clipped straight from the _Rolling Stones_ of their rock star lives. This was a portrait of a roadhouse that they went to frequently a long, long time ago. When they were different people and a different sun stood in the sky.

A blonde spun around behind the counter, mixing drinks for people. Dean visibly brightened for a moment forgetting the time, the place and everything in that split second of blissful forgetting. Sam barely noticed it so transfixed was he by a guy with a mullet in the corner who was playing with a fancy Apple gadget and reminded him of a computer hacker that was his friend once upon a time.

"Hey. Hey, Jo!" Dean waved at the bartender. She turned. And the eyes were blue. As blue as the wound across Dean's soul when he realized that the Irish coffee eyes of Jo Harvelle were not looking back at him.

"Sorry, you're in Seattle. It's called leaded here." The blonde tapped the lid of a French press and leaned on the counter. With a flip of her hair, she had swept Dean under the waves of siren regret. This was not his Jo. Not the girl lost in the fire.

"Oh, yeah. Right. Sorry...Yeah, I'll take that leaded Irish then." Dean smiled. And then he felt it. Sam's eyes. As warm and sad as the memories of brandy moving over his face along with the shadows in the room.

"I thought...I thought she was…."Dean tapped the bar as he sat on the stool. Sam sat beside him, folding his hands as if to pray.

"I thought they all were...Everyone here...Everything about our lives now, man. So familiar and so wrong." Dean continued. Sam sighed. Steam from the kitchen sinks and smoke from the poker table rolled over him like a halo. Dean watched him out of the corner of his eye. Anything to avoid being crushed by the press of that long blonde hair. So much of his life gone into the crucible. So much of his and his brother's lives melted down and crushed in the crucible of a blonde's golden hair, gnashed between the teeth of a fool's wish for treasure that was buried 6-feet-under now.

Except that Jo hadn't been buried. Dean gasped as a coffee was pressed in his hand with a searing heat that reminded him of another blazing fire. Oh, for God's sakes, why was it always the burning of blondes that broke these boys?

Sam ordered the same thing. Smiled at the waitress. She reminded him of another cheerful girl from someone else's white picket fenced yard. One who had the same ghostly blue eyes ...

"Thank you...Good service here. We'll have to come back, huh? What's your name, sweetheart?" Sam tried to make lighthearted conversation with Bright Eyes who was the spitting image of his one time better half- to-be and also almost half his age.

"Jess." The girl smiled.

"Jess...Mm, I knew you reminded me of somebody, Jess. Have a good night." Sam smiled, holding on to the girl's hand for a second as he tucked her tip into her palm. Her eyes flashed in surprise at this "old skeezer" casting smiles at her not understanding that those sad smiles were torn from the faded co-ed scrapbook photos of a paper shredded life.

"Why is it always the blondes?" Dean asked, voicing at last his heartache as the girl skipped away to the arms of a hopeless frat boy with the same shaggy brown hair of another Jess' long lost love.

Sam was watching her and the boy with eyes filling up with smoke and a smile that made a rag doll's frown look happy. Dean discreetly took his brother's hand and slipped it under the table, pressing it palm downward against his knee cap. Who cared if someone saw them or what they thought? So much pain for so long.

"Dunno. Every woman we ever cried for had the same golden hair surprise…"Sam let a soft sigh pass through his nostrils as he sipped the coffee. He set the demon slaying knife on the counter, watching his ruined reflection in the blood.

"You asked me once if I ever wanted something more…"Dean shook his head. Sam looked his way now. Dean looked back. The bar reflected in Sam's eyes, with dry whiskey casting up savor along with a thousand years where rain had never come. They both were once so different before the flames of Hell. Now they were ghosts and this town was just another ghost town they were haunting through.

"Yeah, I know…I know, but now you can't."

"No, I sure as Hell can't. Because if I could have had more, with someone in the life…"Dean looked back at the girl...And he saw someone else. Another girl from another life. His Jo.

Sam smiled.

"Let's hope she never finds out about that. Or she'll kick your ass from the other side." Sam smirked. Dean laughed again as he let the coffee and the whiskey mix like her blonde hair and brown eyes in his soul.

Over the radio, the phantom song rose again. REO?

 _Damn right REO._

"Can't fight this feeling anymore...Now it don't matter what I started fighting for…"Dean sang along as the lights in the bar dimmed and lovers danced. He brought Sam's fist back to the table locked in his hand feeling his brother humming along to the same old tune. Oh, status be damned. He wasn't letting go of his brother until this freaking song went the way that _she'd_ gone. The way that hope and dreams had gone. The road that led to nowhere.

Dean held tighter. He may be a hopeless vagabond but at least he was not a hopeless vagabond alone. Another sad heart sat beside him, singing for a blonde mother and a blonde girl who would never love him like he needed to be loved ever again.


	26. Chapter 26

**Where the Road Runs Out**

It was something from a fairytale, except for the ending. Michael had found them. When they'd been out hunting straggling demons from the Asmodeus days of all things. The Winchesters quickly learned that Michael had summoned the ghosts of every monster they'd ever killed along with legions from other worlds. They were here for them alone.

Sam leaned out the window and exchanged fire with them with a long rifle they'd had in the back seat for 20 minutes. Dean guided their car through a hailstorm on fire as Michael summoned the wind, the sky, the road to torment him. It was ride and it was die. It was "come whatever".

In this haunting reprisal of Apocalypse, Dean felt his brother beside him. He didn't listen to the pelting battle swirling around him. It was Sam's measured breath as he loaded, opened fire, and reloaded all to the tune of a hummed _Hey, Jude_ that was keeping him next to godliness calm.

They drove straight through the iron gates of an abandoned white church. Here the snow fell, for Michael had used a summoning ritual to wake up frost giants. Sam and Dean parked the Impala behind a frozen rose hedge where a curse turned the branches and thorns to blades. They ran inside the church only to feel the door freeze and iron melt behind them.

The church was eerily empty but an altar burned in the center. It looked like the altar where betrothals became vows. And Dean knew. The poetic justice of what Michael meant to do.

" _Look at him...Look how close we are! Other people will die if I don't finish this!" Sam, desperate, worn away by the trials. Sam with the keys to Hell in his bleeding hand._

" _Think about it. Think about what we know. Curing demons, pulling souls from hell...Hell! Ganking a hellhound. We have enough knowledge on our side to turn the tide here. But I can't do it without you…"_

"I was right." Dean smiled. Sam had just pushed a rifle into his hands.

"What?" Sam's face fell with horror. Dean looked him dead set in the eyes, closing their free fists together. Their hands were bloody again with the warfare they were making. Their blood and the blood of legions ran together and spilled to the floor in the spirit of the unsung pact that always was between them. Brothers by blood, bond, and the gears of war. Brothers to the end.

"The last time I made you a promise in a church. We turned the tide alright. Turned it toward us. If this is where it ends, then...I'm glad you're the one to be with me where the road runs out." Dean smiled. Sam's eyes were laughing.

"I'm flattered, but who said anything about this being it?" Sam winked. Michael rattled the walls.

"WINCHESTER! This is where I wipe you from history!" Michael bating, hissing, sending lightning through the roof.

Dean took the rifle in both hands, ready to die. Sam took the other. They stood shoulder to shoulder with the angel blade rounds ready to hold off the onslaught of Michael's manufactured army until they could do nothing else.

"There will be no prisoners this time, Dean Winchester!" Michael called through the walls.

"Great! I always hated cages!" Sam shouted when Dean's voice faltered. Sam's clear voice echoed off the walls. Dean looked at him. Looked and remembered the last time the world ended. How brave he had been at the end when it was his responsibility- his and his alone. Here was his Sam, again. The rock on which his church was built. The beginning, middle and the end of all his stories. This was his legend maker and the reason why all his blood was spilled.

"You know how you said I couldn't save you?" Dean's voice was steady to his amazement. Sam looked his way for a second. He smiled.

"You weren't wrong. But if I can't save you I'm going down with you. And in another life, whichever one comes next...If I have to hop through dimensions like we did when we saved Mom? I'm gonna find my way back to you, little brother." Dean smiled. Michael was ripping holes in reality like water droplets freeze-framed in the air. Soon they would open and the symposium would begin. The war of the worlds and their destruction would close them in the belly of the whale. Win or lose they were probably done for. Unless someone came for them, but who would come in time?

Sam laughed.

"See you on the other side."


	27. Chapter 27

**Forgiveness Where You Fell**

 **-For the ginger friend of my childhood who I will never see again. Oh, how I loved Charlie because she reminded me of you. How we grieve for people who aren't dead. Goodbye, Lily. Find your wings.**

Michael folded up the skies and rolled fire and blood and fistfights into one painful flurry. The ice was swords and the oceans melted through it. Sam and Dean were drawn down, passing through the rabbit hole and the eye of a needle all at once.

Then, they landed on a highway paved with silver. Fire and ice and winter wonderlands rained down on them. Michael landed in a tree, impaled thereon. There was spell work woven into it.

"I guess that's gonna slow you down for now, huh, Chick-Fil-A." Dean spat blood onto the silver road. He was trying to ignore the fact that he and his entire life's worth of Supernatural enemies had landed in a parallel world.

"These trees are magic so they're all trapped for a while. Which is good for me and for my peeps. Good for you too, eh, bitches?" A familiar voice said. Dean looked up at Sam who was staring with a wide-eyed Eureka expression that could only mean the return of God or of a well-loved red-headed girl that they'd once known. The hair on the back of his head stood up. He was not ready to face her if it truly was her.

"Turn around, Dean. Don't make me wait any longer to tell you, _bitches_ , how much I've loved and missed you since the day I said _Sayonara_ to Mother Earth and Father Time." Charlie's voice was filled with authority. Dean turned around, tears raining down his face.

There stood Charlie, just as she had been. Long red hair free falling down her Moondoor costume. Only this time, the effects looked real.

"H-how…?" Dean gasped stretching his hand out to her.

"Oh, pssh...Is that all you can say? Look, I'm not dealing out any info dumping meta right now. I've been waiting for 30 YEARS to know! .Dean?...Is the mark gone? Are you okay now?" Charlie was on the verge of tears. Dean knelt where he was, afraid to move, jaw having dropped. His heart felt like it would explode. He had been hiding his soul from this longed-for reunion ever since he'd seen the Other Charlie in Apocalypse world.

"Sam, the cat or something more monstery has got Dean's tongue. Is he good? Is the mark really gone? The fairies...They told me the war was over, but I've had a hard time believing them." Charlie turned to Sam. Sam who was almost on-cue sobbing, hands shaking, and went to her and hugged her, begging unintelligibly now for forgiveness. And then Dean remembered his harsh words to Sam on the day they'd given Charlie her funeral. How Sam had vowed he would never forgive himself. The hole that was cut in their mutual heart by this tiny root of hatred that now existed in the core of their love.

"Shh...Listen here, Sam. Look at me, buddy." Charlie took Sam's face. He had crawled to her, was on his knees holding her so they would be face to face. She took him by both cheeks and smiled.

"What happened to me is not your fault. Okay? Don't you take that choice away from me! I did it to help Dean. I could have said no to you. I could have. But Sam, you and I both know that as bad as what we did was, it was the only way to save him. Forgiveness is right where you fell, big brothers. I've never blamed you." Charlie smiled palming the tears away from Sam's elated face. Sam kissed her hands, holding them to his face until he regained his composure. Charlie kissed his forehead and helped him stand up. She then turned to Dean who was kneeling at her feet.

"Get your butt up and hug me. I've been waiting for an uber long time." Charlie put her arms out. And Dean, Dean choked back a loud sob...He stood up, one of his hands gripping his mouth. She rolled her eyes and reached and pulled the arm that had once born the Mark of Cain toward herself with all her upper body strength. Then, she rolled up his sleeve, coat and all, so hard she ripped the cuff. There was his arm smooth as the day he was born. She bit back tears now of her own.

"Dean! You're free!" She laughed. And he laughed. And then they both laughed and she jumped into his embrace. He held her tight, eyes closing. It was everything he'd dreamed for years and years. Little soul-sister with her strawberry shampooed-fiery red hair wrapping around him like a magic carpet to anywhere.

He was stammering when he looked into her eyes. She laughed.

"I forgive you. Both of you. For all of it. I didn't blame you after the fact, but...I think you need to hear me say it, huh?" She smiled and traced his face. He was crying all over again eyes squeezed shut. Charlie laughed and straightened his collar.

"We can't stay here, guys. A bit of the meta madness recap. When I died, I broke out of heaven trying to find out for myself if you got free or not. It was after that thing with the Darkness happened, but no one ever told me how that happened, so I assumed it was something evil to do with that book. I thought, well, I got to take responsibility. It is what Sam and Dean Winchester would do and all...So, I found out how to use the Underworld ferry and I found my way to the Fairy World where they make binding spells for things like dark magic, crazed supernatural totalitarians, et cetera. I've been hunting for a Mark cure for 30 years while I waited for some real news. I found a whole bunch more super cool other spells and stuff…" Charlie took Dean and Sam each by their hands and ushered them away from the frozen armies of Michael into the world of magic and chaos.

Dean locked eyes with Sam. He wouldn't be able to say it verbally, but he wanted to spell it out for him with his eyes at this moment that did not need words.

 _I forgive you once and for all for what I blamed you for. I'm so sorry for what I said._ Dean smiled. Sam nodded, unable to breathe and closing his eyes as Charlie led them stumbling along this Dark World's road like a little girl leading her big brothers to the playground. Sam and Dean mutually kicked themselves for being so stupid. Of course, Death wasn't going to keep them apart forever...


	28. Chapter 28

**Two Boys, an Old Drunk, and a Fallen Angel…**

The other hunters came for them, but it was much too late. Michael had already spirited them away to who knew where and who else cared.

Castiel stood in the ashes of what had been a church. His heart was seven thousand miles below this ground and sinking.

He had no idea if they were dead or not, but they may as well be. At least to him. At least for now.

For a moment, he wondered at his foolishness. Of course, he knew that he'd outlive them. Even if they were still alive somewhere out there in the great wild worlds, he knew that he would outlive them in the end.

"Oh, God...the Chief," said Riley first.

"What do we do without him?" Maggie said next.

"They're really gone…" said Mary.

"Oh, God...the boys! Not...This is not real…." Jodie with her hand to her mouth, crying there in the muddy ashes. Cas registered her presence for a moment. Mary may have given birth to Sam and Dean but Jodie was more their mother figure. He sighed inwardly as another voice, one he forgot was his own, snapped at him.

"I stupidly let them do this…" Cas closed his fists around the fire.

And then another tender voice, a fatherly voice, one from the past said into his mind.

 _Nobody lets Sam and Dean Winchester do squat. They do what they gotta._

Bobby.

Cas closed his eyes as tears began to form, out of ashes. As he recalled the story of two boys, an old drunk and a fallen angel.

" _Bobby! Can you believe that freaking Cas here knows literal zilch about Star Trek?!" Dean sitting on the hood of a rusted out old truck._

" _To be fair, Cas doesn't know much of any pop culture." Sam climbed out of the bed of the truck, over its roof, like a spider monkey and landed beside Dean. He swept his arm around him as he nearly pushed him off the truck. Dean leaned back into Sam's chest as he was caught up in his arms and smiled._

 _Cas sat on the lid of a cooler, sipping his first taste of beer. He didn't know if he liked it, but he liked them and this is what they did._

 _Old Bobby with his kind eyes, tattered clothes, and a ball cap that had a year's worth of motor oil on it stood there smiling at his children. Oh, Cas knew he hadn't sired them. But he may as well have. Their eyes called him father even if they called him by his name. The respectful tilt of their chins when he spoke said "Yes, sir." even if they rattled off teasing speech at him._

" _Well, guess we're gonna have to remedy that. When we're not busy stopping Crowley from whatever in literal Hell he's doin'." Bobby smiled at his boys, laughing as they finally re-adjusted themselves on the edge of the truck. They'd been manhandling each other for 5 straight minutes, completely oblivious to it. It was like they were twins except for the difference in their ages. Cas felt the cheer of the summer heat and amusement color his face. They forgot he could see the color of their souls. Sam's was a little worn from the flames of Hell, but whenever Dean's hand took a playful swat at his hair or Bobby's kind eyes settled on him, a bit of its fire licked back into flame._

Cas was snapped back to the present moment. He stood in the center of the ashes. He had found, mostly unscathed because of a spell put on them, a pair of rifles crossed like an X marking the spot. And in the midst of them, the pendant he'd called worthless before he understood. How this could be the family crest of two lost boys, an old drunk, and a fallen angel.

To think they were all three of them gone from the world was more than the angel could bear. He felt his knees giving out. He slid to the ashes and took the pendant up in his hands. The sound of their laughter resonated through it. The taste of their tears. The heat of their blood as it rolled from the wounds of their agonized last stand. Team Free Will…

"I...I...Oh, God! Oh, Father, why…?" Cas clutched his fist to his mouth, remembering that God was his father but they...roughneck and swaggering little humans that they were...They had been his family.

Cas closed his eyes. He was an angel of the Lord. He remembered the first day the grass sprung up all over the Universe. How it plumed with life. Yet he never saw the color of green or vibrancy until he was standing in Hell and a pair of human eyes opened on the dark. Cas realized all too soon, in a landslide of emotions, that Dean Winchester was the first of all humans he'd ever physically touched without any violence. Looked directly into the eyes of. The first human being that he had willfully rescued and the first that got in his head. That he'd needed to personally acquaint himself with.

He was also the first human to talk plainly to him. As if meeting an angel was his every day.

 _The Lord works…_

 _If you say "in mysterious ways" so help me, I will kick your ass!_

All fire, all fury...And the innocence of a motherless boy and a father's forsaken burden in his eyes.

Cas held his breath. He was an angel. Duty was all he'd known. But Dean...he remembered Dean with his back to the wall of the beautiful room, with Cas' hand over his mouth to keep him from shouting. He remembered the pain and the fury and the sudden revelation in those God's green eyes as he realized it.

Dean had been Cas' first choice. First free will choice. Dean was the first ever time that Cas had actually allowed himself to feel something more than angelic duty toward something. He had no idea how it happened. The rough way he talked to him and the fact that he had no qualms about sparring with him should have offended the angel and caused him to smite him. Cas had thought it a silly notion, the idea that a feeling that powerful could begin the first time one laid eyes on another soul. But he'd been color blind before. Love was the color of green and it began when in Hell scorched eyelids opened to reveal the forests and the seas beneath them.

In a domestic sense, much like a mother feels when a baby is put in her arms, Dean was Cas' first love and love at first sight.

 _What if I never see them again?_

By which he'd meant those eyes…

Cas' breath caught as into his mind he saw the swish of cinnamon hair fall away from a smile as bright as fireworks. Sam. A supernova across his heart. If Dean was the first thunderclap of freedom across his heart, then Sam was the lightning to rescind all resistance to the human pull.

Sam was an abomination so the angels said. He was still hated in heaven, so far as Castiel knew. But how could an abomination have such gentleness resting in his eyes? Except for the moments he'd entertained his curse, Cas had not ever met a more docile human being. It was almost painful for Sam to be a hunter. He could be a brutal killer and yet his eyes spelled out an unrelenting need for kindness that made Cas want to bathe himself in his soul and become a better representation of celestial intent. In more ways than the angelic brothers that made his name mud, Cas felt that Sam was an angel.

Sam's hands ran through his hair in Cas' memory and he smiled.

 _What if I never see them again?_

By which he meant smiling teeth, awash in the blood of sunset.

 _What do I do without you?_

Cas prayed. And then, he saw them. In his mind. All the times they'd made a choice that they'd no idea what they were walking into.

 _What if we lured Lucifer to the hole...And I jumped in?_

 _No, Cas, I gotta do this one on my own._

Castiel was crying now, into his fist, and suddenly, suddenly the light sparked in that amulet. The light that said God was near.

And then he heard his Father's voice in his head. For the first time in a long, long time.

 _I can see them...They're alive._

 _Losing them is something I can't take...Bring me back together with them, please! All three of them…_

Cas closed his eyes, unaware that he was suddenly gone from the sight of his friends.


	29. Chapter 29

**Long, Long Ago and Far From Now**

 _ **Prologue**_

 _By the time Castiel had landed in an alternative version of Bobby Singer's heaven, Michael had been wreaking havoc in Fairy World for 1,000 years alternate time. He had torn the Winchesters away from Charlie Bradbury's side. They had fought their way to the River of Immortals. Sam and Dean Winchester were cursed to never age another day. Their lives were entwined and they would die and die and live again, only in each other's company, by a trick of the Fates._

 _This fate that had scared many spiritual creatures of this world far away from Michael's battle line had only empowered the brothers. They became something else entirely. Guerrilla warriors who used spells from the Underworld to tear through the Doors. Sam and Dean fought Michael for eternity and eternity again. Long, long ago and far from now, they came walking down the highway that led to the door of Bobby Singer's real heaven. It was the same day that Castiel had landed there._

 **Present tense of a future day**

"Cas?!" Bobby dropped his beer. He had been working on a Pinto here in heaven. Cas stood up, stunned to a numb mind. For the first time in so many years, a plume of black wings encircled him. Here, in this dimension at least, he was totally an angel again. His wings were visible, drenched in fire. And his friend and former world-saver, Bobby Singer, was here with him again, by some grace that God had allowed.

"Bobby…"Cas almost choked. The burn of the God pendant in his hand alone let him know that this was real.

Bobby came around the car, blinking rapidly. Between them was a moment of confounded silence as all the waiting wind around them suddenly became hushed and still.

"Are Sam and Dean with you?" Cas held his breath.

"Sam and Dean are dead?" Bobby's face fell. Cas shook his head, trying to catch his breath. Too much had happened too soon.

"Oh, one moment...Old friend...So strange to see you on a sudden. No, God sent me. Sam and Dean have been captured by an alternate world version of the archangel Michael." Castiel held his breath, letting his own renewed grace wash him. Total peace had returned when he'd come into Bobby's new and pure heaven. The heaven that God had made and not the one the angels had fabricated.

Bobby scratched his head through the cap, processing.

"Well, if that's the case...Then who's that up ahead?" Bobby's face had fallen in wonder and yet brightened like the first sunrise that was. Because there, like all the times before, and for the first time in Millennia...The Winchester brothers were marching home again.

Castiel felt the heavens brighten, the sun woken out of its sleep and as far as Hell below them now.

They swaggered, leaning on each other, arm around shoulder. Their feet cast up the dust of that lonely road coming back from Nowhere and Everywhere. The sun rose over their backs and in this rarefied place they were younger. Younger even than they were when the curse had rendered them immortal in the Fairy World. Younger than when Cas had known them. And Cas understood instantly. They were young because they were meant to look like the boys that had grown up at Bobby's table. Now they were 20 somethings again, as if no time had passed since the day that Bobby helped them save their Dad and all this odyssey in the Supernatural wars of heavens and hells had begun.

"Sam!? Oh my God! Oh my God, SAM! I think...I think we're in-"Dean's face brightened up as if he'd at last found God. And just maybe he had. The pendant was glowing in Cas' hand. Maybe now, the will of God was understood. The will of God that had woven the unspeakable bond of the four of them together. God had hidden his face from them so that they would look for him and find Him. And now, and here in heaven?...

Sam looked up, with someone else's ancient world and all her wars flashing across his eyes. And just like that, he was at peace. Rendered speechless by the sight.

Against all odds and the slowly depraved press of eternity, Team Free Will had been brought together again.

"We're in heaven…"Sam smiled face flickering with Hanukkah's every light at the sight of the man who was his true father. Bobby's eyes filled with tears, to the surprise of everyone. They blinked away almost as quickly as they came. But this was the answer to every prayer he'd ever prayed since he'd been rendered a spirit in the vast expanse of the sky.

"My boys! How long has it been?" Bobby held out his arms. Each of his boys hugged him in silence and awe.

"For us, about 10,000 years. And that without a single bit of that bright shining as the sun Amazing Grace stuff." Dean smiled, letting out an exhausted breath.

Sam turned to Castiel. His eyes went wide and he laughed. He laughed and then he too was blinking tears.

"You? Is it you?! Oh, it's been so so long…" Sam laughed. Castiel beat his wings.

"For me, it's...it's only been one day since you left the world. And that was far too long." Cas felt he might cry next. Then Dean's eyes, at last, turned on him, and his eyes were wide and his soul was glowing in his face even as his jaw grew slack.

"You...I could never forget you."Dean dropped his rifle. He wouldn't need it anymore. Not here...Not here in heaven. His arms went open and he stumbled on feet as weary as they should be since they had schooled themselves in the way of the road and thorns for these many Millennia. But they at last for all their weary study had finally found it. Home. Home and it wasn't a place. Home was with Sam and Bobby and Cas and all three of them at once.

His arms fell around Cas. His breath caught. Dean's eyes closed. And for Cas, it had only been one day. But holding this man, and his spirit, he suddenly felt it. All of the many, many years. The centuries...The longing for the world he'd come from, the loved ones he'd left in it. Cas being at the top of this list, to the warming of the angel's heart.

"Oh, you...Tormented soul that you have always been...Dean?!" Cas leaned back looking at his friend with a new wonder. For the eons and their epochs flashed before him, all the one red of brothers and their blood. Sam and Dean waging wars that would never be sung about across worlds that weren't their own forever and ever flipped through Cas' mind like a theater of unhappy far off things and battles long ago.

"I have been through...More than I can say or understand. But all the while...I wasn't alone. Sam and I, we swore we would make it back, that we would always keep fighting. That's why I know who you are despite how long ago I knew you...You were my first savior and my only best friend...I never forgot about you, Castiel..." Dean smiled.

"Come on in, everybody. There's beer and bologna and...My God, I don't get many visitors in this lonely corner of heaven...But if I'dda known you all were coming...Oh, this is the best thing that's happened to me for such a long, long time…" Bobby waved his family toward the door of their long lost home. The Singer Salvage house that had gone up in flames a long time ago, along with them. Here in heaven, it was still standing just as it had always been, with their mutual spirit keeping it young and giving it warmth despite a bit of South Dakota's snow still sticking to the ground.

Sam couldn't help himself. He took Dean by the hands, arm wrestling him in a circle so they could stare at each other in awestruck hope.

"Is...Is this for real?" Sam's eyes were burning like stars giving up the ghost, unsure whether to trust in or run from this.

"Sam...Maybe it is and maybe it isn't...And maybe we can't stay here in heaven, but...But let's...Let's let this be one little win…I think it's been long enough, don't you?"Dean smiled, unsure, timid like a wild animal but he nodded. Sam and Dean stood there, jaws dropped, fists knotted together looking up at the doorpost of it. The place they'd strayed so far away from so long, long ago, like a dream within a dream now...

Their lives, every road through the wild lands of war had led them back. Back to the heart of what love meant.

Cas wrapped his wings around either of them, giving them a moment to give in to this amazing grace. This would be the first time they'd heard of it. How sweet the sound...


	30. Chapter 30

**Through the eyes of God**

When Dean Winchester woke up, he thought the little visit with Bobby was just a dream. The smell of beer and the sound of birdsong was a far away heaven he could never reach again. He was lying flat on his back in a king bed in a little American somewhere motel. God had chosen to send him here. To forget everything he'd carried since Michael spirited him away.

For a moment, he thought he was alone. His body was cold. The moonlight from the deep night outside glanced over his face. His head ached and for a split second, so tired did he feel, that he thought he was back in Lisa's house. He thought he was lying here with the aching abyss of little brother's goodbye echoing like a gone shot through him. He drew a shaky breath. Unbeknownst to him, Cas was outside, waiting in the moonlight, testing the strength of his new wings in figure-eights beneath the stars.

Dean shuddered, feeling tears prick his eyes like razors. Even after the eons that he'd spent in Michael's forgotten Otherworld, there had never again been a pain like the punishment of Sam's good deed. He would never forgive himself, not after 10,000 years or ever, for not being able to save his little brother from the end of the Lucifer chapter of his long, drawn out story.

And then, he realized that there was someone else in the bed with him. For a moment, he thought it was Lisa. He wouldn't look at "her" because he felt a deep sense of guilt that he had made a home with her only to someday break it. He broke everything he touched. Of course, he always would. He was broken. His pieces were like saw blades. They would sever every tie he ever made. The darkness in his heart was like the bottom of the ocean. No amount of time…

Dean felt a soft breath like a puff of smoke rising from the hell scorching and to his nostrils. The body in the bed belonged to a man. And then, with a snapping realization, Dean saw that it was his brother beside him. His back was turned to him. With his shirt off, his skin shone in the moonlight, impressed by the same magic as the amulet to reveal the image of his soul. The scars of Lucifer's claws that had dug into his soul were illuminated in the jagged lashes that made his back look like a religious inquisition's aftermath. Dean was drowning here in the bed sheets, horror gripping his whole body. There was always something to remind him. Sam was here but part of him was gone.

It came back a little. The eons were fuzzy. God had put them behind a wall because the conscious mind couldn't handle that much history in a snapshot. But he had brought Sam and Dean back to the Universe they'd been made to protect. He'd left them in this motel. In this one bed so they'd not wake up separated after living so long with only each other as companions.

Dean reached out in the dark and let his fingers trace the scars. Studying Sam here in the moonlight, he realized his brother had been aged-forward from Bobby's heaven back to the age he was when they fell down Michael's rabbit hole. That made him around 36. Dean smiled thinking back to when they were that young the first time. For everybody else, no time had passed. For them, it had been so much longer than the math that Dean could do with a GED and a give em' Hell attitude…

Dean's fingers wandered Sam's shoulders like a piano's ivories spelling out sleep songs. They crept to his hair. The little brother didn't stir, so used to the elder's presence that he was. This teased a smile to Dean's lips that melted away some of the cobwebs of the legends he'd made in monster slaying folklore.

Sam was curled around a pillow, pressing it to his stomach. Dean could see under the sheets that he was wearing a pair of jeans that were stained by their long, long road's Millennia worth of dirt. Somehow God had pieced that ruined article of clothing back together, forgoing the ugly battle jumpsuit Sam had been forced to wear once they'd finally gotten out of Fairy World.

Dean let both of his hands wander to Sam's hair. He laughed at himself, remembering how he would have acted about waking up next to his brother in this kind of bed when they were young. How silly they acted about their appearances back then! Dean chuckled, making over him now like he was sculpting him out of memory.

Overwhelmed with the idea that they were both free now, Dean rolled onto his side and wrapped his arms around his brother. Only now he realized that he was also only half dressed, with a God-restored pair of battle stained jeans on his lower half. He smiled, laying his face against Sam's neck, fanning his hair out on the pillow, sniffing back laughter at the ridiculous rooster's top shape he'd made with it. Sam stirred in his sleep a little, reaching up and taking Dean's hand in his. He went right back down into sleep, comforted by the trace of the elder's fingers. The shape of Mom's wedding ring restored to Dean's ring finger had Sam looping his index finger around that ring, rubbing against it with subconscious anxiety.

Dean smiled. They were back in their own world. That meant that Jack was probably still alive, probably still a kid. That Mom would be here. And Cas…

Sam woke up with a start, knocking the pillow off the bed. He rolled over in Dean's arms eyes wide. Scars from Lucifer's claws were illuminated in his chest and on his cheeks as well. The God amulet was hanging around his neck, shining bright like it did in God's presence, white like moonlight. His eyes wandered Dean's face for a moment, little terrified breaths coming in fast and then slow. A smile crept over his lips. And then, the scars began to melt away from sight. As if the love for Dean was pushing them back into the recesses of his soul, easing the pain in them almost upon visual contact.

Dean smiled wrapping the pendant around his fingers. Sam's eyes followed Dean's hand and he blinked a bit confused by wherever and whenever they were.

"Oh, good. You're awake,"said Chuck.

The Winchester brothers sat up. Chuck sat in a chair at the foot of their bed.

"You're probably wondering why I called this meeting." Chuck smiled.

Neither of the brothers spoke. They were too tired by all they'd seen in the Great Beyond. Dean fell back into the pillows, hand still tangled in the pendant at Sam's neck. Sam sat back on his haunches and tilted his head, watching God with sad and scared eyes.

"You should know that a lot of things about you have changed. But several things have stayed the same. You'll notice that the strength of your bond has become a God-relic..." Chuck smiled.

"English, Chuck, "Dean said at last.

Sam fell back into the pillows with a soft huff. His eyes opened wide when he realized that his scars were illuminated again.

"It's easier if I show you…"


	31. Chapter 31

**But for the grace**

Chuck snapped his fingers. Sam and Dean were swept into the middle of the room by wind unseen. Sam's eyes were wide, worried now that all the wounds and fire damage was done to his soul were visible on his exposed skin. Dean gawked. He didn't even mean to. Yet after living in an alternate time dimension with someone as long as Dean had lived with Sam, he thought there were few details left about the guy that would surprise him. He'd still never seen those scars in all the time they'd been together in the great elsewhere.

"Dean...Put your hand on his chest." Chuck waved Dean forward. Dean swallowed.

"This isn't going to be filmed or any weird kink like that is it?" Dean coughed.

"Dude! You're like talking to freaking God!" Sam shrugged, tilting his head as if to say _Really, Dean?!_

Dean nodded. And then, carefully, he placed his palm on a scar at the center of Sam's chest that looked like it had been made with a hook. Sam had confided in him that once Lucifer hung him from the doors of the Cage, but he'd never wanted to let his mind go there.

Dean's face fell and he felt an instant surge of compassion go up his arm. His hand started to burn a soft white. Dean gasped as Sam's scars began to flicker and disappear.

Sam's eyes went wide, having felt a strange sense of peace go through him, euphoric with the strength of an opium.

"Alright, now, Dean's turn." Chuck snapped his fingers. The mark of Cain and scars from Dean's own time on all Hell rack became visible on Dean's skin. Dean let out a little groan, not having expected that.

"Sam...Do like Dean did." Chuck nodded. Sam reached and took the Mark in one hand and placed his other on Dean's shoulder which was burned perpetually by hooks and chains.

Sam flinched when Dean's eyes rolled with euphoria. Sam's hands came away, glowing blue-white. The scars were gone.

"It look-looks like?" Sam's mouth opened in wide shock.

"It looks like grace. Because it is." Chuck smiled. Sam and Dean looked at Chuck stunned.

"Guys, for some reason, while you two were tripping the light fantastic through my other universes, your bond turned into its own unique kind of grace. It's actually more powerful than archangel grace." Chuck folded his arms.

"We need to test it, but this stuff has amazing potential, boys. To keep you two and Cas alive for starters." Chuck smiled.

"And Jack! Jack would still be a kid here if it's only been one day! W-we we could heal him!" Sam smiled.

"Right. It only works on people you have a true bond with, so if you really really do love Jack, then it will work. Otherwise, it could be a problem…"Chuck proceeded to rattle off random bouts of information. Dean, a bit overwhelmed, pulled a T-shirt on. Sam, a bit cold now, did the same, eyes wide, hair standing on wild ends of static electric grace.

Just then, Castiel soared through the open window and landed on the bed, knocking several of Dean's other-worldly newspapers off a table.

"Sam! Dean! I'm so happy I could sing. You're back and I got my wings back and...Is that grace?" Cas' head tilted to the side, having landed in a heap of wings. He then noticed Chuck.

"Hey, Cas. Glad you showed up. We've got a lot of tests to run. This is probably the greatest creation I ever had an indirect hand in making! Knew I was making the right call when I let you guys go through all that crap…"Chuck turned away.

Cas stood up, completely unaware that he'd entangled Sam in his wings, went to Dean and flipped his hands over.

"This...This is magnificent." Cas smiled.

Dean blinked, stunned, a little smile curling his lip too.

"Uh, I think you turned my brother into a burrito there, feathers." Dean ran his finger down one of Cas' wing feathers. Cas eyes popped open, noticing the tuft of Sam's hair sticking out of the tightly coiled wing.

"Oh! I'm sorry...I forgot about having them open in the house...I haven't had wings in so long…"Cas let Sam drop to the floor in a heap of confounded laughter.


End file.
